A Swordsman's Road
by Dirty Reid
Summary: After he learns of Kyuubi, Sarutobi gives Naruto his family swords. How will his life change as he acquires more swords on the road to Hokage? NaruTen
1. Crocodylus and Asclepius

_**A Swordsman's Road**_

_**Dirty Reid**_

**Chapter One: Crocodylus and Asclepius**

* * *

Shocked.

This was probably the best expression that Uzumaki Naruto was feeling right now. He had just failed the Academy exam for the third time. It was directly after when Mizuki-sensei had tricked him into taking the Forbidden Scroll in hopes of taking it for himself. It was night when Mizuki had found him and attempted to kill him. He had almost succeeded but Iruka-sensei had jumped in the way of the enormous shuriken that was about to hit Naruto. Unconcerned, Mizuki had brushed Iruka away and used his second shuriken to stab Naruto. Naruto had believed that it would be the end for him, but something very unusual happened.

* * *

_Flashback no jutsu!_

Naruto had found himself in a place that could only be described as a sewer. As he ventured through the halls, he heard an unearthly growling noise. He had followed it until he ended up in an enormous chamber. At the back was a colossal cage with a small piece of paper on the gates that read 'seal'. As he had gotten closer, an enormous beast had revealed itself to the blonde. The nine swishing tails immediately gave it away.

"You- you're the Kyuubi!" Naruto had exclaimed, his voice shaking in fear. The fox grinned and let out a booming laugh.

"**You are correct there boy, I am the Kyuubi no Kitsune. We do not have much time, however. As we speak, you are dying. I wish to avoid this at all costs because if you die, I die. Do you understand?"** the huge fox asked. Naruto nodded.

"Well, how are we going to get out of this little bind?" Naruto asked with no small amount of fear in his voice.

"**That is simple. You must accept, however. For if you don't accept, we will both certainly die. What I will do is give you some of my chakra which will heal you. Unfortunately, I am fairly sure my personality will supplant your own. Before you outright reject my proposal, I must say that you have my word that I will only harm the traitor, no one else. It is against a demon's code of ethics to lie, in case you're wondering. Do you accept my terms?"** The fox king asked. Naruto thought for a moment before looking into the fox's red eyes.

"Yes." He answered. Kyuubi grinned.

"**Excellent. Hold still for a moment…"** red chakra began to leak out of the prison bars and surround Naruto. Everything began to grow dark…

* * *

Mizuki watched in satisfaction as the 'Demon Brat' fell to the ground. He would be treated like a hero after this. He was reaching out to pick up the scroll when an enraged roar came from Naruto. Looking right, Mizuki almost cried out in shock when a red aura began to emanate from the blonde. Naruto then stood up and yanked out the shuriken in his stomach. He turned to the left and glared at the terrified Chuunin. His now red, slitted eyes stared into the silver-haired man's corrupted soul.

"**Foolish mortal,"** Kyuubi's voice overlapped Naruto's normal one. **"you thought you could defeat US?! We will make you pay for your stupidity, human!"** Naruto then jumped at the man and began to beat him ferociously. Several loud screams of agony erupted from the Chuunin. After a moment, Naruto/Kyuubi stopped. They looked at the scroll and thought about testing the first technique. Mizuki was looking up at the demon boy with a tiny amount of hope in his eyes. This was quickly shattered.

"**Don't think we're done yet mortal; we have at least another five minutes before anyone learns of our presence. KAGE BUNSHIN NO JUTSU!"** Naruto/Kyuubi roared. There were a couple hundred puffs of smoke and the clearing was stuffed with Naruto clones. The original, who was the reddest, grinned insanely.

"**Destroy him."** He commanded.

_Flashback no jutsu, kai!_

* * *

Now, Naruto sat in front of the Hokage's desk with the old man staring at him.

"This is all the truth Naruto-kun?" he asked, his gaze never waning.

"Yes Jiji, that is the absolute truth." Said Naruto, staring straight back at Sarutobi Hiruzen. The Sandaime Hokage sighed as he got up.

"Well, in that case, I feel it's time to give you your heirlooms." Said the old man. He motioned for Naruto to follow him. Naruto was rather confused and excited.

"Just before you were born, your father and mother knew the Kyuubi was going to raze the village. On that day, they wrote their wills, leaving everything to you. But most importantly, they left you these." Hiruzen lifted a pair of elaborately decorated wooden boxes out of a chest in the back of his office and handed them to Naruto. The box on the right had a strange staff with wings on it, surrounded by two coiling snakes. The box on the right had a picture of a crocodile on it. Both of the boxes had letters addressed to him on them. Naruto took the box on the right, and opened the letter.

_Dear Naruto,_

_If you're reading this letter, Hokage-sama thinks that you're ready. As he probably told you, we wrote these letters before the Kyuubi attacked. If you don't already know, the Yondaime sealed Kyuubi inside you, as it was too strong to kill. He wanted to see you as a hero, but I fear that the villagers will not see you as one. I can only assume that you know about it now. But enough about that._

_Enclosed in this box is my family's sword, Asclepius. This sword can only be wielded to its full potential by someone of my blood. Its true purpose is a medical sword. It produces its own limitless supply of chakra which makes it almost indestructible. You can also transfer chakra to people who are injured or drain them of it. It will also replenish your own supply of chakra if you are not at capacity whenever you use it. When you get good enough, the sword will teach you how to resurrect recently deceased people. Don't ask me how it does it, nobody in my clan knew._

_Always remember this Naruto; you have a family and we love you, no matter what._

_Your loving mother_

_Koori Suishou_

_P.S.: As our name implies, the Koori clan specialized in Hyoton techniques. You will find a scroll containing some of our clan techniques in the box as well._

Naruto opened the box as he put down the letter. He pulled out Asclepius and examined it. The handle was shaped like a winged staff with a pair of snakes coiling around it. Grasping the handle, he pulled the blade from the plain black scabbard. The blade itself looked like an ANBU katana blade, but with a slight blue tint to it. The sword itself was just less than three feet long, and extremely light. Naruto twirled it around a little bit before he re-sheathed it and opened the next letter. He frowned at the very sloppy, but legible, writing.

_Naruto,_

_If you're reading this, Jiji thinks you're ready to take on the world. I'm too lazy to go into a long explanation of why the village hates you, just look at your mother's letter for that. This may come as a shock to you, but I was the one who sealed Kyuubi into you. That's right; you're the son of the Yondaime._

_To you, I leave my family blade Crocodylus. Word on the grapevine was that this sword was forged by the Egyptian god Sobek who had a crocodile's head and a man's body. It's made of adamantite so it is unbreakable. This sword is a chain sword; this means that it can be extended on a chain when you transfer some chakra into it. This makes it perfect for long range attacks as well. You can also create elemental attacks by reinforcing it with your elemental chakra. Use this sword well, and remember that I will always love you._

_Your father_

_Namikaze Minato_

_P.S: If you're like me, you'll have a knack for Futon jutsus. Inside this box is a scroll with Futon jutsu, my personal jutsu, and the instructions to raise the clan manor. I never told anybody about this last little gift, but I created the summoning contract for the crocodiles about a month before you were born. It is enclosed in this box as well. If you master the Kuchiyose no jutsu, don't go around summoning crocodiles all the time; I don't want my old sensei to be TOO jealous of you. _

Just below the last line was a picture of a stick man standing on a badly drawn crocodile. Off to the side was another stick figure depicting an angry man with a long mane of white hair. Naruto laughed at this. This was replaced by complete shock; the Yondaime was his father.

'_I wonder how the village would react. They'd probably grovel at my feet and beg for forgiveness. Heh, I could ask for money! Power! Women! Anything at all could be mine!'_ Naruto's evil thoughts were cut short by the Hokage addressing him.

"Naruto-kun, since you have read this, I feel I should warn you not to go around calling yourself Namikaze Naruto. Your father had a great deal of enemies from Kumo and Iwa who would kill to have your head. I would advise that you not call yourself by your mother's surname either. The Koori clan had a lot of enemies in Hoshi and Kusa. So calling yourself Koori Naruto probably wouldn't be a good idea either." The old man warned him with a small smile as Naruto pulled out Crocodylus. The handle was about a quarter of the blade's length and wrapped in a cushiony white grip. The pommel of the blade was shaped like a golden crocodile with its jaws open. The two-pronged hilt gave way to an almost three foot blade. The blade itself was double-sided with a slight blue-green tint to it. Every two inches or so, there was a thin crevice which signified the chain links. Counting them, the segments totaled twenty. Naruto quickly transferred some chakra to the blade and gave it a flick. The segments came undone and moved in a wave motion, just as Naruto had flicked the blade. He transferred some more chakra to it and Crocodylus snapped back to its original form. Naruto grinned.

"Heh, I can see the headlines now! Uzumaki Naruto: Swordsman Supreme!" said Naruto, striking a pose. The Hokage chuckled.

"Don't think you're hot stuff just because you've got a set of extremely coveted swords, techniques, and a summoning contract boy. You still need to learn how to use the swords and jutsu." said the old man. Naruto's grin slipped a little bit.

"Well, I might as well sign the summoning contract." Naruto picked up the large scroll and opened it. The name slots were completely blank. Naruto suspected that his father and mother had not signed it because they would probably die soon. Hiruzen instructed Naruto to sign his name in blood, and he did so. He offered the scroll to the Hokage, who politely declined, so Naruto strapped the scroll over his back. He closed up the sword boxes and looked at the old man.

"Is there anyone here who can teach me kenjutsu Jiji?" Naruto asked.

"Indeed there is. I will send for him and have him train you. The maximum time he can train you for is only three months, however. Once that time is up, I will place you on a Genin team." Naruto looked shocked at that final statement. Using his moment of silence, the Hokage placed a finger on the list of Jounin and transferred some chakra to one of the names. This sheet was almost like a summoning scroll; it made the special Konoha tattoo on the requested Jounin's arm tingle, indicating that the Hokage wanted to see them. As he finished, Naruto spoke up.

"B-but don't I have to pass the exam in order to be made a Genin?" he asked, startled.

"In your case Naruto-kun, I'm willing to make an exception, as you exceeded the limitations: You defeated a Chuunin level traitor, and learned a Jounin level kinjutsu. I really don't think you need to demonstrate 3 E-rank jutsus in order to become a Genin. Speaking of which, you need a hitai-ate." The old man opened a small box on his desk and pulled out a strange hitai-ate. It was shaped like the normal one, but the Konoha symbol was that of a Japanese oak and intricately carved with the indentations painted red. Naruto stared in fascination.

"This is one of my first hitai-ate. Konoha stopped carving this design over forty years ago, and I do believe that this one is the last in the village." Sarutobi explained as he handed Naruto the headband. Naruto took it, tying it around his forehead. It looked good on him.

"Thanks Jiji. When's that sensei gonna get here?" as if on cue, a cloud of smoke appeared, and out stepped a young man. He wore a dark blue outfit with the Konoha Jounin vest over top. On his back was an ANBU style katana. His hair was covered by a bandana style Konoha hitai-ate. A few stray locks of dark brown hair fell about his pale, slightly sickly looking face.

"(Cough) You called Hokage-sama? (cough)" The man asked, covering his mouth as he coughed. Naruto quickly sized him up.

'_He doesn't look like he can take too much more before he bites the shuriken.'_ Naruto thought to himself.

"**Rule number one about being a ninja kit; NEVER underestimate your foe."** an unseen voice said in a reprimanding tone. Naruto jumped slightly.

'_Kyuubi? Is that you?'_ he mentally replied.

"**Yup. Our little meeting created a sort of empathy bond which allows us to communicate mentally. Like this, I can also sense anything you do. If you prove to be worthy, I may decide to teach you some stuff I know, but don't think I'm getting soft, I STILL HATE YOU!"** Kyuubi roared out the last part.

"Yes I did call. Naruto, meet Gekko Hayate, your new sensei. Hayate-kun, meet Uzumaki Naruto." Hiruzen introduced them. Naruto extended his hand, and Hayate shook it while giving Naruto a small grin.

"Nice to (cough) meet you Naruto." Hayate said warmly.

"Arigatou Hayate-sensei. No offense or anything, but you really look like you need a trip to the medics." Naruto commented. Hayate frowned.

"(Cough) I assure you Naruto, I'm (cough) fine. I've had this condition for years." Hayate explained. Naruto's face was impassive for a moment before he shrugged.

"If you say so." Naruto answered nonchalantly.

"Well Naruto-kun, Hayate is the best swordsman in Konoha. I believe that you will do well under his tutelage." Sarutobi advised Naruto.

"I'll take your word for it Jiji. When and where do you want to start training Hayate-sensei?" Naruto looked at the young Jounin.

"Training ground 14 (cough) tomorrow at 9:00 sharp. Okay?" Hayate asked him. Naruto bowed low.

"Hai." He answered. Hayate smiled and vanished with the Shunshin.

'_My life is about to get very interesting.'_ Naruto thought.

"**No shit."** Kyuubi threw in his two cents.

* * *

**Like it, hate it, leave a review please!**

**Translations:**

Crocodylus- The genus in which crocodiles are classified under.

Asclepius- A.K.A the Herald Staff used by the Greek god Hermes, Asclepius is the universal medical symbol of a winged staff encircled by two snakes.


	2. The Road's Beginning

_**A Swordsman's Road**_

_**Dirty Reid**_

**Chapter 2: The Beginning of the Road**

* * *

Naruto showed up at Training Ground 14 with about twenty-five minutes to spare. With nothing better to do, Naruto opened his father's Futon jutsu scroll and began to look at a couple of the lower level techniques. He didn't bother to bring his mother's scroll because he knew this training ground didn't have a water source. Naruto figured he would probably need a nearby body of water before he tried to condense water in the air for his jutsu. He eventually decided to try a jutsu called 'Futon: Renkudan'. Naruto took some time to memorize the seals and called out the jutsu.

"Futon: Renkudan!" (Wind Release: Drilling Air Bullet) Naruto inhaled and transferred some chakra to his breath. He blew out the air in one swift blow. The large puff of air was about the size of his head. The air in the bullet was distorted by his chakra and spiraling rapidly as it screamed towards a tree. Naruto's eyes widened when the projectile drilled through the tree and exploded when it hit the next one. Naruto grinned and tried again, putting more chakra into the attack and compressing it. This time, the Renkudan drilled through multiple trees and left a long streak in the ground.

Feeling satisfied with learning a C-rank jutsu in two tries, Naruto pulled out Asclepius with the intent to get a feel for the sword. Holding it in his hand, Naruto felt his only slightly diminished chakra reserves being refilled. Holding the sword out in front of him, Naruto began to give it light test swings. He eventually progressed to unprofessional thrusts, slashes and parries. He began to string them together as he moved rather awkwardly around the field. He really needed some work.

After about ten minutes, he re-sheathed Asclepius and drew Crocodylus. He repeated his exercise with his late father's blade, but began to try and use the chain feature after a couple of minutes. Naruto found that if he transferred his chakra into the blade when he was thrusting, the blade would extend on the chain straight forward at a high velocity. It took time, but he eventually managed to get the timing right and was able to do an extended thrust without too much lag between ending the move and extending the blade. He did the same exercise when slashing and parrying. He could extend his slashes to hit enemies that tried to jump away, and he was pretty sure that he could wrap Crocodylus around an enemy's weapon, impeding their mobility. He was about to try and subdue a Kage Bunshin with Crocodylus when Hayate showed up with a swirl of leaves.

"(Cough) Good to see that you're practicing Naruto." Hayate praised him. He looked around the training ground and surveyed the minor destruction. "Your handiwork, I'm assuming?" He asked with a raised eyebrow.

"Yup, Futon: Renkudan." Naruto replied. "What are you going to be teaching me first?" Naruto asked with an eager glimmer in his eyes.

"Well first (cough) I'm going to teach you (cough) how to handle your sword properly. (Cough) Don't get me wrong, you had (cough) the right idea during your little warm-up, but (cough) your technique needs a major overhaul."

For the next hour-and-a-half, Hayate had Naruto practice his primary moves with one sword at a time, correcting the little mistakes he made. Whether it was a hand turned the wrong way or a foot pivoted less than needed. The mistakes were subtle, but Naruto could feel the difference that the corrections made. After thirty minutes of practicing his basic moves, Hayate called a halt.

"Good job Naruto. You're (cough) getting this a lot faster than I expected (cough)." Hayate praised. "I believe (cough) it is time for me to teach you a special little technique called an iaijutsu (cough). Iaijutsu is where you attack when drawing your sword (cough) like so:" Hayate threw a shuriken up in the air. He then placed his hand on his katana, and drew it with a flash, slicing the shuriken in two. Naruto's eyes widened. Hayate showed him how to position the blade by pressing it against the sheath as he drew it for extra force. Naruto gently laid his hand on Crocodylus' handle. He stared at a tree that was about twelve feet to Hayate's right. Focusing on a small knot in the tree, he drew Crocodylus and transferred a quick burst of chakra to the blade. Crocodylus broke into the chain segments and flew at the knot. Naruto was slightly disappointed when the ending segment missed by about a foot and only scratched the bark. Hayate looked impressed.

"You have (cough) fair aim with this being your first day using a sword Naruto, but your concentration is a little off…"

* * *

The first month was spent perfecting Naruto's technique. Naruto often took only one to three tries to get something perfect. Hayate was extremely proud of his student. Over the first month, both shishou and decchi found that they had several things in common. They both found peace while sitting on top of the Hokage Monument; they both were enticed by the scent of lavender, and enjoyed watching the stars at night out on a hilltop.

The second month was spent on the more practical aspects of kenjutsu. Naruto was taught the proper way to perform slashes, thrusts, parries, and counter-strikes. Naruto got his techniques down quite quickly, taking just more than three quarters of the time Hayate had judged. Impressed, Hayate added another aspect to Naruto's training; teaching Naruto the Shuriken Kage Bunshin no jutsu. It took Naruto about two weeks to master this jutsu. Shuriken and kunai were completely symmetrical, but the difference in the swords made perfecting the A-rank technique a little bit tricky. When Naruto finally perfected the technique, he insisted on calling it Tsurugi Kage Bunshin no jutsu (Sword Shadow Imitation Technique). With Naruto learning all of Hayate's material in such a short time, Hayate taught Naruto the Tsubaki no mai (Dance of the Camellia). This particular sword dance was a quick burst of speed, followed by multiple hits to the opponent's vital points; the heart, lungs, stomach, liver, and finished with a cut to the carotid artery. It took Naruto over two weeks to get this dance down, but he managed to perform it satisfactorily.

* * *

"(Cough) Okay Naruto, you've been doing very well. The (cough) third month will be devoted to learning (cough) sword dances and the art of (cough) Zatoichi." Hayate explained. Naruto understood the first part, but frowned at the last.

"Zato-what?" Naruto asked Hayate, eyebrow arched.

"It is the way of the blind samurai. (Cough) There may be times when you cannot trust your eyes. Therefore (cough) you must rely on your other senses; hearing, smell, and touch. We will be starting this immediately (cough) and we won't be quitting until (cough) you can do it satisfactorily. Pull down your (cough) hitai-ate…"

Over the next half of the month, Naruto learned the Zatoichi fighting style. He didn't perfect it, but he could defend himself well enough if his vision was impeded. For the last month (Hayate had requested more time to train Naruto when the lull in missions had started), Hayate taught Naruto several sword dances; the Yanagi no mai (Dance of the Willow), the theories of the Karamatsu no mai (Dance of the Larch) (as Hayate could not use a chain sword out of inexperience) and the two part Tessenka no mai (Dance of the Clematis): Tsuru and Hana. This dance operated on the same principle as the Karamatsu. Naruto had little trouble learning these sword dances. His one problem was that he was a little on the slow side as he had started wearing weights. His weights were only a problem for a short while, as Kyuubi lent some aid in building Naruto's muscle mass and stamina. Hayate was delighted to hear that Naruto already knew Kage Bunshin when he decided to teach Naruto the Mikazuki no mai (Dance of the Crescent Moon). Naruto had this jutsu down within twelve days of it being taught to him. Unbeknownst to his sensei, Naruto had also been working on several of his own sword dances in secret.

He had also utilized some of his family's jutsus to create new attacks. The Hyowa no jutsu (Ice Ring Technique) was one example. By transferring his ice chakra to Crocodylus and twirling the extended blade, Naruto was able to form a freezing dome of ice around his foe and him. While his opponent would be freezing due to the sub-zero temperature inside the dome, Naruto (Immune due to Kyuubi's influence) would be free to attack his opponent at will. Another one of his self-created techniques was the Hyoton: Furea no Hyoyari (Ice Release: Flare of Ice Spears). This technique required a lot of ice chakra transferred to Asclepius. Naruto then raked the ground with Asclepius and imbued the jutsu with a quick burst of wind chakra at the last second. The ending results were a dozen or so extending ice crystals from the point where Naruto had struck the ground. So far, Naruto had managed to extend the Hyoyari to about seven metres. He was pretty sure that he would be able to extend them further when he got better control over his huge chakra reserves.

He had also mastered most of his father's Futon jutsu and had managed to create two custom Futon jutsu. The first one was the Futon: Renkuken (Wind Release: Drilling Air Fist). Naruto had to compress and spin his wind chakra around one or both of his lower arms to form a pair of wind drills. Based on the results from testing it on trees and rocks, Naruto could probably drill through anything. His second customized Futon jutsu was the Futon: Hyogufu no jutsu (Wind Release: Freezing Tornado Technique). This jutsu required an immense amount of wind chakra to be spun around at high speeds, much like the Renkuken. But this jutsu required Naruto to release chakra from all of his tenketsu, much like a Hyuuga's Kaiten. Naruto had to lace about thirty-five percent ice chakra into this jutsu, coupled with sixty-five percent wind chakra to get it to work properly. When the tornado struck the opponent, anything from frostbite to complete bodily function shutdown could occur. Not a pleasant thought, OR jutsu. Another good thing Naruto had been practicing was using his chakra to control the wind around him. He could create a bubble of air around him that he could move with his chakra. Currently, he could decrease his weight and jump around as though he were on the moon. Nothing flashy, but he was working on making himself faster.

* * *

Naruto was currently sitting on the small pond located at Training Ground 27. Hayate had told him that his final test would take place here. Hayate hadn't told Naruto what the test would be, but he said to bring his swords. Naruto was meditating while sitting on top of the water, a chakra control exercise Hayate had taught him before he made Naruto practice light kenjutsu against him. Naruto was rather surprised that he had thought meditation had just been something superstitious people did to try and calm down. He had been skeptical at first, but it actually worked. Meditating was almost as calming as star-gazing, once he knew how to meditate properly. His bliss was interrupted when he heard not one, but two pairs of footsteps. Opening his eyes and standing up, Naruto turned to see Hayate, accompanied by a beautiful purple-haired woman. Her dark eyes and deep magenta lips were accented by her pale, porcelain-like face. She was wearing an undone ANBU cloak, but Naruto still saw that she had a delicate, but strong frame. Naruto shook his head to stop from staring when Hayate addressed him.

"Naruto (cough) I'd like you to meet my girlfriend (cough) Uzuki Yugao. Yugao-chan, this is Uzumaki Naruto." Hayate introduced the two. Yugao smiled and nodded to Naruto slightly. She despised the fox demon for killing several members of her family, but she held no ill emotions towards the jailor. Naruto, seeing this emotion, jumped off the lake and activated his Kaze Suiho (Wind Bubble). He had jumped in a rather flashy fashion, and both Hayate's and Yugao's eyes widened slightly when he floated through the air for a moment before landing in front of them.

"How did you do that?" Yugao demanded. Naruto grinned foxily at her.

"Incomplete personal jutsu; I call it the Kaze Suiho. I use my chakra to compress the air around me enough so that it can support my weight and move me around. I can't _quite_ fly like a bird but I can float around for a couple of seconds." Naruto paused to look at their faces. Both had bug eyes and open jaws. Naruto threw back his head and howled with laughter. He stopped when he heard several other footsteps. Quieting down Naruto looked around to locate the source of the noise. Naruto's eyebrows quirked when he found the source; it was several people emerge from the foliage and into the clearing. Iruka-sensei was one of them. Following him was a Jounin wearing a green spandex suit and orange leg warmers, sporting a bowl-cut hairdo and enormous caterpillar-like eyebrows. Slightly behind the freaky Jounin was another one with gravity-defying silver hair, a dark blue outfit, and a mask covering most of his face. Currently, his nose was buried in an orange book called "Icha Icha Paradise".

Arriving about six seconds later along came a beautiful red-eyed female Jounin with slightly unkempt black hair and a gorgeous figure which was accented by the red and white one-sleeved dress. Holding her hand was a bearded Jounin wearing standard ninja attire with a cigarette sticking out of his mouth. Upon closer inspection, Naruto deduced that he was probably related to the Hokage. Just behind them was a purple-haired woman wearing _very_ sexy- almost borderline skanky- clothing with a trench coat. She looked at Naruto and licked her lips with a smirk, making Naruto shiver. Naruto was genuinely shocked when a person he recognized as the Hyuuga Head- Hyuuga Hiashi, if he recalled correctly- strode calmly into the clearing with a little girl who looked about seven or eight. But the real jaw-dropper was when Jiji himself showed up followed by a trio of men. One had dark blond hair, while the second was rather lazy looking with a couple of diagonal slashes on his face. The third man was rather plump with a huge mane of bright red hair. Once all of them were assembled, they all took a good look at Hayate's opponent. Murmurs concerning his vintage hitai-ate started to flitter about them. The reading Jounin even put down his book and looked at Naruto in interest. Naruto turned to his sensei with a slightly exasperated look.

"Mind telling me WHY you invited half of the Jounins and honourables in Konoha to come and watch me kick your ass, sensei?" Naruto asked. This naturally elicited an 'ooh' from the crowd and Naruto was pretty sure that he heard one of the Jounin say 'That's beef!' Hayate scowled at his decchi slightly.

"(Cough) what makes you so sure that you'll (cough) be able to beat me Naruto?" He asked, regaining his calm composure. Naruto allowed himself a small grin.

"I'm feeling lucky." Was all that he said before he drew Asclepius. Hayate walked up to Naruto and drew his sword, Gengetsu (Crescent Moon). A hush fell over the crowd as master and apprentice bowed to each other.

"You're (cough) allowed to use any jutsu that you want (cough). But you can only use (cough) one sword at a time." Hayate instructed him. Naruto leered at him.

"You scared sensei?" Naruto taunted playfully. Hayate's eye twitched.

"Yeah-ha-ha! You go kid!" shouted the purple-haired, scantily clad Jounin. Several of the other Jounin turned to her with odd expressions, and another couple of them chuckled at her antics.

"Uh… Thanks hottie." Naruto replied, and grinned when he saw her blush. He turned back to his sensei and raised Asclepius in front of his face. Hayate mirrored his movements. Naruto then moved Asclepius forwards and slid the blade along Hayate's, savouring the sweet music of steel against steel. Naruto then removed his blade from Hayate's and cancelled his chakra weights. Hayate stood with his right foot directly in front of his left, and pivoted to the right, sword held casually at his right. Naruto stood with his right leg extended in front of him with most of his weight on his bent back leg. Caduceus was held with the unsharpened side of the blade against his right arm. For a moment, everything was still. Naruto was forcibly reminded of a samurai movie he had seen once; featuring Hayate as the calm, cool master plainly dressed, and facing off against his slightly more flashy student. Naruto had abandoned his orange jumpsuit in favour of darker, stealthier clothing that still attracted attention. He was wearing a deep red shirt with a black Japanese oak leaf on the chest that matched his hitai-ate. He was wearing loose black pants with a dozen or so pockets and slots for his ninja gear. Over his back, he wore a long jacket that could double as a hooded coat. Everyone seemed to be holding their breath as the lapis lazuli eyes of Uzumaki stared into the chestnut brown orbs of Gekko. A slight breeze whispered through the trees, waving Hayate's hair and fluttering Naruto's cape.

As soon as the breeze was silenced, Naruto charged at Hayate with surprising speed. He changed the grip on his sword, making it flick out as a slash. Hayate dodged the slash and countered with an upwards vertical slash. Naruto blocked the attack and countered with a flurry of stabs. Hayate was forced onto the defensive as Naruto attacked relentlessly. Hayate took the opportunity of Naruto using a rather slow thrust by swiping his blade out of the way, and delivering a spinning roundhouse kick to Naruto's chest. Naruto flew backwards, landing on his ass. Hayate grinned as he prepared a jutsu.

"Katon: Ryuuka no jutsu!" (Fire Release: Dragon Flame Technique) He called as he launched a large blast of fire at Naruto. Unfortunately for Hayate, Naruto had a couple of tricks up his sleeves.

"Hyoton: Fubuki no jutsu!" (Ice Release: Snow Storm Technique) Naruto cried as a large stream of ice cold air with small chunks of ice and snow laced into it shot from his mouth. The two jutsus met, and the Fubuki cancelled out the fireball as it rushed to meet Hayate. Hayate managed to evade the blast, and watched it sail past him. His jaw dropped when it hit a tree and became an inch thick crust of ice. Most of the Jounin were shocked, not at the effect, but at Naruto's use of _Hyoton_ jutsu. Out of every 3000 ninja, give or take a few, there was usually only one or two who could use Hyoton techniques. But about seventy years ago, a relatively small and reclusive clan that could use Hyoton techniques had appeared out of Takigakure. About thirty years later, the clan had gone on a killing spree against Hoshigakure and Kusagakure. They had succeeded in wreaking havoc on the two villages, but the said villages were always out for their blood afterwards. It was about four years after that massacre that Hoshi and Kusa had declared war on Taki in hopes of destroying the clan. Most of the clan had scattered to the wind, fleeing to other ninja countries where their talents could be appreciated. Unfortunately, very few of them had been able to pass on their Kekkei Genkai, so most of them had died out. There was a rumour that a couple of these clan members had been executed in Water Country which was under the 'Kill anyone with a bloodline' policy at the time. Another _extremely_ outrageous rumour was that one of them had come to Konoha and left an heir somewhere amongst the shinobi clans. So far, any searches had yielded no results. The only information that was on the clan was that it was called 'Koori'.

Naruto was dodging a flurry of attacks from Hayate. He was gradually being driven back towards the water, and concentrating on evading an enemy's sword blows coupled with controlling the proper amount of chakra to stand on water was no easy task for Naruto yet. He quickly ran through a couple of ideas, and only one particularly dangerous gamble seemed to be a possibility. Naruto jumped back from Hayate's assault, threw Asclepius up into the air, and began forming hand seals.

"Futon: Renkuken!" Naruto commanded. He held up his left arm and directed the spiraling chakra to it. Immediately his arm became engulfed in the wind drill. He raised his right arm, caught Asclepius, and began an assault. Hayate was hard pressed to avoid Naruto, as the wind drill often gave of sharp little tendrils that could cut up blocks of wood.

'_If the tendrils are that powerful,'_ Hayate thought to himself _'I'd really hate to see what the drill will do.'_ His mental wondering was answered when Naruto thrust the drill at him, missed, and drilled a tunnel straight through the immense boulder he had been standing behind. Hayate was googly-eyed for a moment before he heard Naruto coming at him again, minus the wind drill. Hayate was done playing. He stepped back onto the water and started forming hand seals.

"Suiton: Daibakufu no jutsu!" (Water Release: Great Waterfall Technique) He shouted. An immense vortex of water rose up and flew straight at Naruto, who formed his own hand seals and gathered a huge amount of chakra.

"Futon: Dairenkudan!" (Wind Release: Great Drilling Air Bullet) Naruto cried, exhaling a huge blast of wind. The two jutsu met, and the huge air bullet tore straight through the water vortex. Using the sheet of water as cover, Naruto ran for the lake and dived in. It was time to show off.

Hayate uncovered his eyes as the falling water cleared. Looking around, he saw no sign of Naruto. The confused looks on the Jounin's, the single Chuunin's, the Hyuuga's, and the Hokage's face indicated that he had slipped away under the cover of the jutsu destruction. Hayate started to look around, but saw no trace of the blonde ninja. He heard a faint popping noise, and looked down to see several bubbles rise out of the water, followed by a strange shadow that was growing rapidly. Hayate jumped away from the shadow just as it broke through the surface of the water.

When the water cleared, Hayate discovered the shadow to be an enormous, emerald green crocodile jumping out of the water, snapping its jaws at him.

"HOLY SHIT!" Hayate yelled in surprise and terror. Naruto had been holding onto the crocodile's tail and flew at Hayate with Crocodylus in his hand. He looked like he was about to slash at his sensei, but he turned it into a crescent kick which sent Hayate onto dry land. Hayate attempted to get up but Naruto was already bearing down on him, Crocodylus poised by his head.

"Moroha no mai!" (Double-Edge Dance) Naruto announced. He began with a downward diagonal slash to the right, knocking Hayate's blade away, and cutting his arm not so shallowly. Naturally, Hayate dropped Gengetsu. Naruto twirled the blade and thrust it forwards into Hayate's left thigh, piercing the muscle. Naruto spun around and did another diagonal slash, cutting Hayate's other leg, causing him to fall to the ground. Naruto then jumped into the air while spinning, positioning his blade in a fashion that made it look like he was about to cut Hayate's head off. But Naruto then moved the blade so that it made an incision on Hayate's left arm. Hayate drew it to him in pain. Naruto then held Crocodylus to Hayate's throat.

"I win." Naruto stated. There was a shocked silence from the audience; Uzumaki Naruto had just defeated Konoha's best swordsman. As he was the first to recover, Hiashi began to clap. The little girl beside him joined in. The Hokage followed suit. The three men that had accompanied the Hokage began to clap as well. Eventually, all of the Jounin began to applaud for the spectacle they had just seen. Naruto raised his arms.

"Thank you, I can feel your love, thank you!" Naruto said, cockily. Looking down at his sensei, he re-sheathed Crocodylus and drew Asclepius. He swept the blade over Hayate's wounds, healing them instantly.

"Thank- cough- you Naruto. You have done- cough- very well in these past few months. Could you tell me- cough- about that last sword dance you used?" Hayate asked. Most of the Jounin and other nin had inched closer, listening intently.

"Sure. The Moroha no mai is only complete sword dance. It's usually meant to kill a foe, but I didn't want to kill my sensei. It's really meant to go like this; the first strike cuts off the opponent's sword arm. The second strike pierces their stomach or lung. The third strike slashes both of their legs, and the final strike has two options… Well, three actually. The first one is to cut the opponent's head off. The second option is to slice their chest open. The third option only applies if the opponent is male, and that is to cut off the thing that any man holds dearer to him than anything else in this world, if you get my drift." Naruto explained. At the mention of the final statement, _all_ of the male shinobi present covered their 'high and mighties' almost in defense, while the kunoichi laughed uproariously.

"Yes indeed, a truly nasty attack." Naruto stated, confirming the males' thoughts.

"Well Naruto-kun, with your little display of swordsmanship, I think it's time for you to be placed on your Genin team." Said Sarutobi, pipe in his hand, beaming at the boy. He turned to the Jounin who were assembled, and Genin instructors. He then shouted out in a VERY un-Hokage like fashion.

"ALL JOUNIN INSTRUCTORS!! THERE IS TO BE A BATTLE ROYALE HELD RIGHT NOW!! THE WINNER GETS NARUTO ON THEIR TEAM!!!" The old man bellowed. He seemed to be forgetting something because he then added "OH, AND ANY JOUNIN WHO WANTS HIM ALL TO THEMSELVES MAY PARTICIPATE! SO, GET READY TO RUMBLLLLLLE!!!" Sarutobi announced. For a second, there was silence, and the brawl started. Naruto sweatdropped.

'_Sheesh, a lot of people want to teach me pretty badly.'_ He thought as he dodged a stray kunai thrown courtesy of the plump, red-haired man.


	3. The Path to Greatness

_**A Swordsman's Road**_

_**Dirty Reid**_

**Chapter Three: The Path to Greatness**

**Hello again, and welcome back to A Swordsman's Road! The votes are in, and the points for Naruto's sensei are as follows:**

**Mitarashi Anko: 18**

**Gekko Hayate: 6**

**Team Asuma: 3**

**Team Kurenai: 5**

**Team Gai: 4**

**Team Kakashi: 8**

**Ino-Shika-Cho Trio: 2**

**Nara Shikaku: 4**

**Yamanaka Inoichi: 1**

**Akimichi Chouza: 2**

**Sorry to all who lost in the poll. On with the story bitches!! .**

Naruto was more than a little freaked that so many of the Jounin in Konoha wanted to teach him. He had seen some truly barbaric moves that no sane ninja would use in a brawl. For instance, he had seen the plump man who he now knew as Chouza actually _body slam_ several of the other competitors. _Not_ a pretty sight. The purple haired woman was the most violent of all; slugging, kicking, slapping, and biting at anything she could hit. The spandex clad Jounin seemed to be the strongest, as he had used a sunset flip on the blond-haired man and the fat one. Asuma was punching anything that came near him. His girlfriend tried to avoid the fight as much as she could, and was trying to use genjutsu to pick off of the competition. At some point however, a pissed Kakashi pulled her into the fight and they began to wrestle on the ground. This resulted in her dress being wrecked and torn up, revealing a bright red satin bra and matching panties. The Hokage had passed out from a nosebleed, and had just woken up when Anko's shirt had been torn off; making it common knowledge that she didn't wear underwear. Naturally, he AND Iruka rocketed away, propelled by twin jets of blood from their nose. Naruto was a little more restrained and just pinched his nose shut while closing his eyes. He opened them, and looked over at Hiashi. He was twitching. Suddenly he grinned maniacally and yelled out:

"DOG PIIIIILE!" and he jumped into the fray. Naruto sweatdropped, as did Kyuubi in his mind.

The fight had gone on for at least an hour. Naruto was now cursing himself for not getting popcorn. As he was berating himself again, he noticed something; it was quiet. Naruto turned, and face vaulted when he saw the pile of unconscious Jounins.

"Well Naruto-kun, I guess-" he was cut off as Shikaku flew out of the pile, and out came a topless Anko, covered in cuts and bruises and blood. She weakly got to her feet, looked at the Hokage (Who was barely restraining himself from trying to grope her) and Naruto, and gave a rather weak smirk.

"I win." Was all that she said before she fell to the ground, out cold. Shaking his head, Naruto created several K.B.'s (**A.N.: If you don't know what this means, see my other story (ch.5)) **and a couple of Koori Bunshins (Ice Clones) who picked up the sleeping Jounins and carried them to the hospital. The hospital staff was shocked, to say the least when the 'Demon' came in carrying multiple unconscious Jounin and Hiashi Hyuuga accompanied by the Hokage and a single Chuunin. The clerk dared not question the blond boy's story for fear of being arrested by the Hokage. The hospital medics took the unconscious nin without question, and began to heal them. With nothing better to do, Sarutobi invited Naruto and Iruka back to the Hokage Tower for some cha.

* * *

"Well Naruto, I guess you will be taught under Mitarashi Anko from now on." The old man stated simply, as he sipped his cha. Naruto was looking thoughtful.

"Wait a second, don't I need to be on a team to enter the Chuunin exams, or something like that?" he asked. Iruka's eyebrow shot up at the once dopey, dense kid's perceptiveness. _'My little Naruto's growing up.'_ He thought fondly.

"Under most circumstances a team is required, yes. But there have been exceptions in the past, and I'm more than willing to make one for an aspiring young sword master such as you." Sarutobi explained as he took another sip of cha. Naruto nodded, and suddenly voiced a question that he had been wondering about.

"So… Mitarashi Anko… What's she like?" he asked. A hush fell over the two older men. They looked at each other for a moment. The Hokage nodded to Iruka who rolled his eyes and looked at Naruto.

"To put it simply; Anko's psychotic." Iruka stated. Naruto's eyebrow shot up.

"Please; elucidate for me." He said. Sarutobi raised his eyebrows at Naruto's use of words.

"She was taught by the Snake Sannin, Orochimaru. She thought that she had a good thing going, until he branded her with the Ten no Juuin (Cursed Seal of Heaven) and left her for dead. She was broken by the loss of her sensei, but she started to act the way she does when the villagers recognized her as 'The Traitor's Student'. This pressure eventually made her develop the bloodlust that everyone sees her with nowadays. But once you get to know her, she's actually a nice woman; unless you call her 'snake bitch' or steal her dango." He chuckled at the last statement. "Come to think of it, Anko loves dango almost as much or more than you love ramen Naruto." The old man grinned when he saw the boy's eyes flare as though he had been challenged.

"NO WAY! NOBODY has a greater obsession for ANYTHING than me!" Naruto shouted, looking offended. Iruka laughed.

"Say that to her face, and she'll whoop your ass." He said more to himself.

"I heard that, you traitor!" Naruto snapped at him jokingly. Sarutobi openly laughed.

"Well Naruto-kun, I suggest that you go get some sleep. If I know Anko, you'll want to take a dirt nap just to make her stop training you." the Hokage said to him. Naruto gulped slightly as he turned and left the office.

"Naruto," Naruto turned as the Hokage addressed him. "your training ground will be the one you just finished your test at. Anko should be up by now, so why don't you drop by the hospital and tell her." It was more of a request than a question. Naruto shrugged and walked out of the office. Sarutobi and Iruka looked at each other, somewhat at a loss for words. Suddenly, Iruka dropped a bomb the Hokage hadn't known about.

"Anko doesn't know kenjutsu, does she?" he asked. Sarutobi smacked his head.

'_Shit…'_

* * *

Naruto hopped over the rooftops, cape swishing behind him. More than once, the metal blade in the bottom clanged against a roof and caused him to lose focus. Naruto really resented not using this weapon in combat.

'_It took me SO long to find that, and I wind up not using it…'_ Naruto's thoughts were interrupted when he had to swerve to avoid a hitting a bird that flew in his path. It was some sort of kingfisher; royal blue, and elegant. Watching it fly away, Naruto suddenly got an idea. He put the idea away in his 'how to be an awesome shinobi' file for the moment, and hurried on towards the hospital. Once there, he strolled casually up to the front desk. The receptionist didn't look too happy to see him.

"I'm looking for Mitarashi Anko." He told her.

"Why? You're going to try and kill her or something, aren't you, demon?" she spat at him. Naruto was pissed. A death threat was in order. As though he had heard something, he looked down at Crocodylus.

"What's that Crocodylus? You 'want to taste her blood'? Okay!" he looked back at the receptionist, and drew Crocodylus with an evil smirk. She immediately paled.

"Room 201!" she squeaked out, shielding herself with her hands. Naruto snorted.

"Pathetic creature; you don't deserve to be called a human." Naruto snarled as he sheathed Crocodylus and skulked off. Many people stopped their duties as they watched Naruto swagger down the halls, but nobody said anything. After a moment, Naruto reached room 201. He knocked on the door before he entered. The room had plain white walls, a single window, and a large, comfy-looking bed. Anko was currently sitting on it, and reading a magazine called 'Kunoichi on the Prowl'. She looked up when she saw Naruto.

"You okay Anko-sensei?" he asked, hands in the pockets of his pants.

"Yeah, I'm fine. The nurse says that I'll be out in an hour or two- did you just call me Anko-_sensei_?" she asked, confused.

"Yeah, you won the battle royale. Whoever won got to teach me, remember?" he asked. Anko's face was blank for a moment before a look of recognition dawned on it.

"Oh yeah, I forgot about that..!" she trailed off for a second or two "I'm not going to have to teach another two brats, am I?" she asked, an annoyed look on her face. Naruto gulped nervously; he did_ not_ like that look.

"Nope, it's just gonna be you and me." Naruto replied. The sour look on Anko's face vanished in a flash, replaced by a smile.

"I'm glad you approve. Oji-san says our training ground is number 27, something about great elemental diversity or something like that, I wasn't really listening. What time do we start tomorrow?" he asked, looking at the pondering Tokujou **(Short for Tokubetsu Jounin)**.

"7:30, and if you're not there, I'll feed you to my snakes." She threatened. Naruto scoffed.

"You forget the laws of nature Anko: Crocodiles eat snakes." He shot back.

"Smug bastard…" he heard her mutter as he left the room. This was going to be fun.

* * *

Naruto found himself at Ground 27 again. He had a couple of minutes to spare, so he walked out onto the small pond, sat down on a rock, and began to meditate. He began to focus on the smells of the training ground, as appose to hearing the noises like he had yesterday. He smelled the slightly musky scent of the stagnant blue water of the pond. The slightly tangy scent of the tree leaves. The not unpleasant stench of the earth beneath him. Another scent that smelled like sterilizer and just a hint of cheap perfume reached his nose. Opening his eyes, Naruto saw Anko standing on the water, watching him.

"Nothing like a little meditation to start off the morning, eh kid?" she asked him.

"Nope, always calms me down when I want to." He replied as he jumped off the rock, and made it to the shore. "What do we do first sensei?" he asked her.

"Well, let's start with an introduction." Anko cleared her throat. "I am Mitarashi Anko. My likes are dango, red bean soup, torture, and training. My dislikes are arrogant bastards, fangirl ninja wannabes, and snakes. My ambition is to one day track down that hebi-teme (snake bastard) of a sensei, and rip his skull out to use as a cup." She finished with a look in her eye that Naruto didn't like at all. It was gone a second later as she grinned at him, and told him to introduce himself.

"I'm Uzumaki Naruto… well, sort of. I'm actually either Namikaze or Koori Naruto. I-" He was cut off by Anko.

"_Koori_ Naruto?! So it's true? That sword really IS Caduceus, the Tatsujin Tsurugi no Iryounin?!?" she half shouted at him. Naruto was looking a little afraid of the Tokujou in front of him.

"Uh, yeah, why do you ask?" he questioned. She stared into his eyes, her own wide.

"The Koori clan is legendary! They were the BEST Hyoton ninja ever known in the elemental countries. I don't know if this story is right, but apparently a couple of nin from Hoshigakure and Kusagakure tried to kidnap some of their clan children to learn the Hyoton secrets. The Koori clan stopped this, and proceeded to massacre Hoshi and Kusa for their crime. Unfortunately, those two villages bounced right back and tried to exterminate them by destroying Takigakure (Hidden Waterfall). Most of the clan got away, but couldn't reproduce, so they died out. But there was a rumour that one of the Koori left an heir in Konoha, but you just confirmed it!" Anko exclaimed. Naruto was shocked; he belonged to a famous clan which had massacred not one, but _two_ villages single-handedly. He was starting to appreciate his mother even more. His train of thought was stopped when Anko told him to continue his introduction.

"As I was saying, I like ramen, training, Hayate-sensei, and my swords. I dislike arrogant assholes, fangirls, and prejudiced idiots. My dream is to become Hokage and prove to the idiots who said it can't be done by a dobe. Oh, my other ambition is to see an Aburame's face, completely uncovered." He finished. Anko whistled.

"Interesting ambition you have there Naruto. Well, first off, we should start with a technique assessment. Tell me what you know kid." Anko told him as she watched him intently.

"Well, I can do two of the Academy jutsus, Henge and Kawarimi. I can't do the Bunshin, but I _can_ use the Kage Bunshin. I can use about nine or ten Futon jutsus, and about eight or nine Hyoton jutsu. I know the sword dances Tsubaki, Yanagi, Karamatsu, Tessenka, Mikazuki, and my own personal sword dance, the Moroha no mai. I'm almost done one of my other sword dances; the Yuukaku no mai (Dance of the Orchid). I have my own summoning contract as well. Good enough?" he asked to his wide-eyed sensei. Naruto cleared his throat, bringing her out of her spell.

"Uh, wow. You know a lot more than I expected from some punk almost fresh out of the Academy. I'll be able to help you with ninjutsu, and taijutsu, but I'm a little shorthanded when it comes to kenjutsu." She admitted sheepishly, scratching the back of her head. An idea popped into Naruto's head.

"I think I know how to solve that problem sensei." He said to her. "I really don't need to be taught a lot more kenjutsu for the moment, so how 'bout I teach you some?" he offered. Anko was looking at him, a delicate eyebrow raised.

"You'd do that for me?" she asked, not quite believing what she heard. Naruto smiled.

"Well why not? Genin teams are supposed to operate on teamwork, so why can't a master and an apprentice do the same?" Naruto stated. Anko was surprised at Naruto's sense of logic. _'When did he get so smart?'_ she thought. Naruto seemed to hear her thoughts, because he responded:

"I 'got smart' when I dropped the mask. The little façade of being a loud, dumb fool was just a way of getting attention. Now that I know why everyone hates me, I can drop it and focus on being a good ninja." Naruto explained. Anko was shocked.

"You just described my thoughts so well, it's scaring me." she told him.

"Uh, thanks?" he replied uncertainly. There was a moment of silence before Anko voiced a question.

"You don't have any spare swords, do you?" she asked him. Naruto shook his head.

"Nope, I guess you'll have to buy your own. C'mon, I'll fly us back to the village and you can pick out something. Anko looked confused.

"You can fly?" she blurted out in disbelief. Naruto grinned as he marched over to her. He grabbed her arm, and activated the Kaze Suihou. This time, he compressed the air around him much more, and started to raise the half underneath them. Anko cried out in shock as Naruto made them rocket upwards, and back towards the village. Naruto whooped in glee; he felt so free, now that he was able to use the Kaze Suihou to fly. Anko, however, was too scared to speak and simply held onto Naruto's arm for dear life.

* * *

Uchiha Sasuke and his teammates Haruno Sakura, and Chuuken Mato walked casually through the village square with their sensei Hatake Kakashi, mission completed. Sasuke didn't think much of his team, believing that they would only hold him back from his ambitions. Sakura was weak; there was no doubt about it. Granted she was intelligent, for which Sasuke respected her ever so slightly, she knew only the Academy jutsus and had a rather sub-par physique. Albeit part of this was due to the fact that she was the first ninja from her clan in hell knows how long. Another one of her problems was that she was a fangirl; she was more focused on looking pretty and trying to win his affection than being a serious kunoichi. Kakashi had told him that she needed to start training seriously when he had defeated her with a simple genjutsu depicting a dead Sasuke. She had been mortified, but returned to her usual self when she saw Sasuke buried in the ground; fawning over him, melodrama and all. Sasuke detested the pink-haired bitch almost half as much as he detested his brother. He had made this blatantly clear on multiple occasions, but she would still bug him for a date constantly.

Mato was an okay person. He was a plain-looking boy with light brown hair and grey eyes. He was slightly shorter than Sasuke, but slightly more talkative. He came from a small family with a line of shinobi dating back about forty years; most of them just average ninja, serving the village for a lifetime and passing peacefully. Sasuke knew that Mato wasn't as strong as him, but he knew Mato took his training seriously. On the day of the survival test that Kakashi had told them about, Sasuke had come upon Mato running through a couple of complex taijutsu katas when he had come to the training ground. After about twenty minutes, he had started a kata that used the ten inch dagger that he always carried around. Mato was also quite intelligent, as he had proved during the bell test. Sasuke's respect for his other teammate had grown slightly when he had figured out that they needed to work as a team to pass the bell test. Kakashi-sensei had praised Mato's efforts, but criticized Sasuke's reluctance to work together with his teammates. This had enraged Sasuke slightly. He was an avenger; a lone wolf. He was supposed to take on the world in a quest for power, acquiring enough so that he could kill his brother. He wasn't _supposed _to work with others. It wasn't in his nature.

Sasuke's musings were interrupted when he heard someone yelling in delight. He looked around, but saw nobody. The villagers seemed to be just as confused, as they were searching around to locate the source. The yell was heard again, accompanied by a frightened scream. Sasuke realized suddenly that the sound wasn't coming from around them; it was coming from _above_ them. Looking up, his eyes widened slightly when he saw a caped figure holding onto a woman in a trench coat fly by. A closer look revealed who the person was, and it pissed Sasuke off.

'_How did that dobe learn how to fly? And where did he get those swords?'_ Sasuke thought, as he got a look at the black sheaths on Naruto's right and left hips. Sasuke was immensely curious- as well as a little peeved that the 'dobe' could fly- as to how Naruto developed that skill. Mato, Sakura, and Kakashi were all looking up in interest as well.

"Sheesh, first he beats Konoha's best swordsman, now he can fly. Naruto's gonna go a long way in life." Kakashi said quietly. Unfortunately, the three Genin heard him.

"What are you talking about Kakashi-sensei? Naruto-baka could never defeat anyone in combat, let alone a swordsman! He was the class dobe!" Sakura piped up, in hopes of Sasuke approving of her words. Kakashi glared at her fiercely, making her recoil slightly.

"Do not judge people Sakura. You may think that Naruto is an idiot from the way he acted at the Academy, but that was just a proverbial mask that he wore in order to get attention. Since he became a Genin, he has dropped that mask and started to focus on being a real ninja. I was not lying when I said he defeated Konoha's best swordsman. If I had to compare him to someone, I'd say that he could probably hold his own against both Mato and Sasuke. He would be somewhat hard pressed to take them out though. He wouldn't even have to _try_ and beat you Sakura, so it would be wise to stop shooting your mouth off." Sasuke was looking like he was about to blow his stack upon hearing that the dobe was better than him, and Mato was looking curious and a little peeved. Sakura just looked crushed. Kakashi noticed and sighed.

'_Two hotheads and a fangirl as a team. Why do you hate me__ so, Kami-sama?'_ was the thought that went through Kakashi's head.

* * *

With a final cry of delight from Naruto, and a final scream of shock from Anko, master and apprentice landed in front of a weapon shop. Anko's face was ghostly white, and her eyes were like dinner plates. While babbling slightly, and shaking uncontrollably, she lost control of her legs and fell into Naruto's arms. Still quivering in terror, she clung to him. Naruto grinned; this was perfect blackmail material.

"Aw, suck it up ya big baby. You were taught by one of Konoha's deadliest nukenin, you've had more scratches with Shinigami than a lot of people will, and people look upon you in terror but you're _afraid of heights_!? That is just sad." Naruto didn't get a chance to laugh, because he was currently given a concrete snack, courtesy of Anko.

"Shut up you little shit, or I don't teach you jack." Anko snapped at him. Naruto just chuckled as he got up and walked into the shop. It was a fairly ordinary looking shinobi weapon shop; dim lighting, larger weapons on the walls, smaller ones in glass cases. Naruto pointed Anko into the direction of the swords.

"Just don't pick some huge-ass zanbatou or something, because I can't use one of those." Naruto reminded her. Anko shrugged and went off to look for a sword. No sooner had he turned away from her when a girl came out from the back room. She had brown hair that was done up in two buns near the back of her head. She was wearing a pink Oriental style shirt and dark green pants. Her chocolate brown eyes lit up when she saw Naruto and Anko browsing around.

"Can I help either of you two?" she asked. She had a sweet alto voice that was absolute music to Naruto's ears. _'Easy on the eyes, AND ears; what a girl.'_ he thought.

"**Oh yeeeaaaahh…"** came Kyuubi's drawled reply in a tone that could be considered sexy, but borderline creepy.

"No, she knows what she wants, but thank you for the offer…" Naruto trailed off. He didn't know the girl's name.

"Tenten, Tsukiakari Tenten." Tenten introduced herself.

"Uzumaki Naruto and she's my sensei Mitarashi Anko." Naruto replied. Tenten nodded, but she was focusing on the swords in Naruto's belt.

"May I see those fine swords?" she asked with a strange twinkle in her eyes. Naruto nodded and he pulled Crocodylus and Caduceus out of his belt. He handed her Crocodylus first, as she had been looking at it a little more than Caduceus. Tenten took the sheathed chain sword gently.

Only to have the crocodile head shaped pommel extend and bite her wrist.

Tenten gave a quick cry of pain before she dropped the sword. As soon as her fingers left the handle, the crocodile head relinquished its hold on her wrist. The sword fell to the counter with a clang that resounded around the entire shop. Anko had heard Tenten's yelp and a clang, so she dropped the wakizashi she had been examining and darted over to the two Genin.

"What's going on over here?" she demanded as she observed Naruto and Tenten staring at Crocodylus. Anko's eyes narrowed slightly.

"Why are you two staring at that sword?" she asked, a little confused.

"Well, Tenten here just found out that Crocodylus had a special little safety feature the hard way. Anyone who is not related to me who touches the sword gets bit by the pommel, as you can see there." Naruto indicated the bleeding, tooth-like holes in Tenten's wrist. Crocodylus' little safety feature made Naruto start to wonder about something.

"I wonder…" Naruto muttered as he pulled Caduceus out of his belt. "Sensei, touch Caduceus' handle with one finger and tell me what happens." Naruto said to Anko. Anko hesitantly stretched out her right hand and placed her middle finger on the handle. She gasped a second later and yanked her hand away. As she did, Naruto could have sworn he saw the air freeze for a fraction of a second around the handle of Caduceus.

"The sword tried to freeze my finger!" Anko exclaimed, glaring at the blade.

"Hmm, I suppose that would make sense." Naruto commented. "It does come from an icy family." He said to himself as he pulled the blade out. He gently ran the now glowing sword over Tenten's injured wrist, and the holes healed up instantly. Her eyes almost popped out of her pretty little head at what the sword had just done.

"Yes, this is the legendary Tatsujin Tsurugi no Iryounin." Naruto said to the bun-haired girl. Tenten looked at him intensely.

"Where the hell did you get this?!" She demanded in a tone that could be considered a shout. Naruto recoiled slightly at the volume.

"It's a family heirloom. That's really all I can say." He told her with an apologetic look in his eyes. "I'd like to tell you more, but I don't really know you that well." Tenten was looking a little hurt at Naruto's words.

"But having a friend my own age would be really nice." Naruto added quickly. Tenten looked at him in surprise. A smile slowly graced her face.

"I'd like that a lot." She said to him. "I'm taking a lot of missions with my team, but I'll try and make time in the future." Tenten informed him. Naruto grinned.

"Arigato Tenten, I really appreciate this." he thanked her profusely. Tenten didn't have time to respond, because Anko came up to the counter carrying her weapon of choice. The weapon was a katana that was mostly black with pale purple clouds adorning the sheath and wooden handle. Seeing Naruto's 'Show me the goods' look, Anko unsheathed the blade. It was the normal shape of a katana, but the blade was an unreflective pale purple colour

"I think I'll call it Murasaki (Violet)" Anko said slowly. Naruto raised an eyebrow, but shrugged a second later.

"Seems fitting enough. We'll take this sword please, Tenten." Naruto said to her. Anko was more than a little distraught when she was told that the grand total for the newly named Murasaki was 30 500 ryou. With waterfalls of tears dripping down her face, Anko emptied her cobra head shaped wallet of every last bill and coin. Naruto was barely restraining himself from chuckling as she began to scream again as he flew them back to the training ground. This time he landed rather roughly and she simply fell to the ground, whimpering slightly. Producing a small camera, Naruto quickly snapped a couple pictures of Anko whimpering on the ground in a fetal position. He quickly stashed the camera in one of his pockets and made a note to give the pictures to the ANBU Interrogation Unit. Silliness aside, he told her to stop being a pussy and get off her ass. This insult had her on her feet faster than an Uchiha could probably track.

'_At least she's eager to learn.'_ Naruto thought to himself.

* * *

Over the next two months, Naruto and Anko continued to help, and train each other. Anko had a main chakra affinity for Doton techniques, but a side affinity for Suiton techniques; just to a lesser extent. Naruto was able to learn the Suiton techniques quite easily, as Hyoton chakra was a combination of wind and water-based chakra. Anko also taught Naruto some of the jutsu that she had learned from Orochimaru, as well as a nifty little jutsu she picked up from Uchiha Itachi, the Bunshin Daibakuha (Clone Great Explosion). Naruto's taijutsu skills were slightly lacking at this point, so Anko took it upon herself to teach him her personal style, the Hachuuken (Reptile Fist). This style wasn't tremendously difficult, as it mainly focused on speed and flexibility to dance around the opponent. Anko later proved to be a natural at swordplay, learning the Tsubaki and Yanagi no mai in about three weeks. Anko also got the Moroha no mai in about two days. Very soon, they held their test.

It was in a small clearing in the Shi no Mori (Forest of Death) that the final test was held. Naruto stood across from Anko, Crocodylus drawn. He was wearing a forest green vest over a fishnet shirt, which covered his light plate armour. He was wearing pants of the same colour, with his weights discarded. He would need all of the speed he could muster for this battle. Unknown to Anko, Naruto had placed the special chakra-reactive metal throughout his slightly oddly shaped cape. The cape was quite long at the sides, and there appeared to be a sort of bite mark in the bottom middle part of it. When Naruto transferred chakra to it, the cape would extend and harden into a pair of long, pointed, almost bat-like wings. This cape gave Naruto the ability to glide nimbly through the air, or ride the occasional jet stream that blew above Konoha. If there was no wind, Naruto could simply use his wind chakra to create a strong updraft, using less chakra to fly around. Anko hadn't changed her outfit much; she had simply put some armour on underneath her clothing (or lack of), and discarded her trench coat. She had Murasaki resting upon her shoulders; much like someone would rest a zanbatou over their back. It was dead quiet as Genin and Tokubetsu Jounin stared each other down, gazes never wavering.

"Ready sensei?" Naruto whispered, with his eyes narrowed. Anko leered.

"Bring it on." Was all she said before she disappeared. Sensing her approach, Naruto jumped straight up into the branches before the purple blade of Murasaki slashed where his neck would have been a second before.

For the next couple of moments, both teacher and student darted through the trees while exchanging quick blows. Unknown to them, four other presences were trekking through the forest in a training exercise. Those four were Konoha's Green Beast Maito Gai, his mini clone Rock Lee (Sans the Jounin vest), the arrogant Hyuuga Neji, and the sweet little Tsukiakari Tenten. Gai-sensei had taken them on this trek to observe their endurance skills, a necessity for a ninja. So far, Gai and Lee appeared to be faring well. Neji looked a little tired, and Tenten was panting.

'_Sometimes I almost regret being on a team with these nut jobs.'_ She thought sourly. Her musings were cut short when Neji let out a yell.

"INCOMING BOULDER!!" He cried out, jumping up with his team following. No sooner had they evaded than a huge mound of earth came hurling out of nowhere, snapping the top of a small treetop. Four heads turned simultaneously to see a boy and a woman locked in a duel of flashing steel. Four sets of eyes widened at the speed that the two combatants were moving at. Tenten looked closer and discovered that the two nin were the people that were in her shop a couple months ago: Uzumaki Naruto and Mitarashi Anko.

'_Whoa, these two are good.'_ Was Tenten's immediate thought upon the battle.

'_YOSH! WHAT A DISPLAY OF YOUTHFULLNESS!!'_ (Guess which two thought this)

'_Those two are strong. But only fate will tell who will succeed.'_ Was Neji's thought. Looking closer, he noticed that although the blond boy seemed unhindered, there were multiple scratches, abrasions cuts and bruises all over him. Anko looked a little better, but she was a little cut up as well. The combatants ceased the flailing swords, and broke out the jutsus.

"Doton: Doryuu Dango!" (Earth Release: Earth Mausoleum Dumpling) Anko announced. She plunged her hands into the ground and lifted up an immense chunk of earth the size of a small house like it weighed nearly nothing. Without hesitation, she threw the immense earth dumpling at Naruto, who was forming his own seals.

"Futon: Dairenkudan!" Naruto called, exhaling a huge ball of air about half the size of the Doryuu Dango. Both attacks met, and the Dairenkudan tore through the Doryuu Dango, splitting it into dozens of smaller pieces and dust. One large piece managed to hit him, ensuring Naruto would have a really nice shiner later. Smirking, he formed about twenty-three more seals that Tenten could see. "Futon: Furyuudan no jutsu!" (Wind Release: Wind Dragon Bullet Technique) Naruto shouted. He inhaled deeply, and unleashed an enormous torrent of air. The stream of chakra-infused air took the shape of an immense dragon. It flew at Anko while emitting a high pitched shrieking noise. Anko managed to jump out of the way at the very last second, but one of the 'spines' managed to graze her leg, drawing blood slightly. Anko winced as she landed slightly awkwardly, and painfully. Focusing some chakra into her leg in a specific manner, the cut began to glow green before healing up. That moment's hesitation was all that Naruto needed as he drew Caduceus.

"Hyoton: Furea no Hyoyari!" he announced as he raked Caduceus along the ground. There was a faint bluish-white flash and about eight extending crystals of ice charged at Anko. Anko managed to pull off an awkward looking jump and dodged the attack. She sprinted along one of the ice spears and brought Murasaki down onto Crocodylus. Naruto buckled slightly under the attack, but shook off Anko's strike and retaliated with a fierce swipe. Anko dodged and attempted a Tsubaki no mai, but Naruto either dodged or blocked all of the strikes. He thrust Crocodylus forward, and attempted to stab Anko. Tenten knew immediately that his reach was too short to connect. But her eyes widened when Naruto's blade extended about twenty feet upon a large chain. Anko managed to bridge dodge the attack, but Naruto charged in and punched her in the stomach, sending her to the ground. Anko managed to kick Naruto in the face and roll away before he could force her to yield. She jumped away with a complex little flip and formed a seal.

"Sen'eijashu!" (Hidden Shadow Snake Hand) Anko cried as five dark green snakes shot from her sleeve and made a beeline for Naruto.

"Hyoton: Fubuki no jutsu!" Naruto replied and launched a blast of icy cold air laced with ice crystals and snow at the snakes. The two jutsus met, and the snakes froze with the ice traveling their length. Anko was unable to release the jutsu in time, and the ice blast froze her arm. With the extra weight, the snakes fell to the ground and disappeared. Anko also knelt down, clutching her arm. Naruto walked up to Anko slowly, Caduceus held rather loosely by his side.

"Game over sensei." Naruto stated. Team Gai's eyes were almost out of their heads.

"… I DON'T THINK SO!" Anko screeched as she brought her ice-encrusted arm up to meet Naruto's face. Small gouts of blood flew from his mouth as the freezing bludgeon smacked him in the face and shattered. Naruto was surprised and impressed, but it was time to end this. Naruto leered at his sensei as he prepared the Koori clan's signature stealth jutsu.

"Yukigakure no jutsu!" (Hidden Snow Technique) Naruto announced. Immediately, a fierce wind picked up and began to howl. The air froze and the thick moisture condensed into a blanket of snow. Naruto vanished from sight, and Anko's bare skin was stinging from the snow. Up on their perches, Tenten and Neji both had chattering teeth and full body goosebumps. Gai and Lee seemed unfazed.

'_Freaks of nature.'_ Tenten and Neji thought simultaneously. Anko was trying and failing to discern anything through the snow storm. Needless to say, she was failing miserably. She couldn't feel Naruto's chakra through the dense storm either; the wind was blocking her pulses. She was concentrating so hard on trying to find him that she didn't hear his near silent footsteps.

"Yuukaku no mai!" Naruto called, barely discernable through the wind. Anko felt something rush past her left side, followed by a searing pain. Looking down, Anko got a sight of a slash in her waist, bleeding slightly and stinging like a bitch in the cold. Naruto rushed by her again, this time on her right side, cutting her on the way. He repeated this process four times, cutting her across the back and the stomach before appearing in front of her and kicking her into the air. Anko fell onto her back about fifteen feet away. The storm died down very quickly, and Team Gai was shocked when they saw Naruto standing over Anko. Both had their blades out and at each other's throats.

"Well, well; looks like this is a draw sensei." Naruto stated. Anko smirked at him.

"No," she said before she exploded into smoke, revealing a small rock.

'_Shit! Kawarimi! Question is, where-'_ Naruto's train of thought stopped abruptly when he felt the cold steel of Murasaki against his throat.

"_I_ win. You did well though kid, that last dance took a lot out of me." Anko winced as her cuts gave another painful twinge. Team Gai was shocked beyond all belief.

"Your only problem is that you have a hard time discerning between fakes and the real one. We'll have to do a little work on that, but later. For now, let's rest and I'll try and get us a C-rank or something tomorrow." Naruto raised an eyebrow slightly.

"Don't Genin have to do D-ranks for a while before doing higher rank missions?" Naruto asked Anko, a little confused. Anko gave a disgusted snort.

"What, are ya chicken? D-ranks are stuff civilians do! I don't wanna stand around and catch the Daimyo's wife's damn cat every day. Besides, I know you want a little action as much as I do." Anko spat out. Naruto shrugged; Anko was right. He pulled out Caduceus and healed her wounds. As he was pulling away, Naruto tensed for a moment. The hairs on the back of his neck were standing up; they were being watched. For some odd reason, Naruto could pinpoint where this incredibly creepy feeling was coming from. Turning about sixty degrees to his right, Naruto threw Caduceus at the crotch of one of the particularly large trees and performed the Tsurugi Kage Bunshin no jutsu. Caduceus multiplied into about twenty blades and screamed towards the tree. A frightened cry came from the tree and four figures jumped out of the way of the swords. Naruto's eyebrows popped straight up when he identified one of them as Tsukiakari Tenten. One of the others was a Hyuuga with an arrogant, angsty look about him. The last two… were near identical copies. Identical green spandex jumpsuits, orange leg warmers, ENORMOUS eyebrows, and bowl cut hairdos that read 'Nin' where the light reflected off of it. The larger one spoke, his voice echoing through the forest.

"YOSH! THAT WAS AN EXTREMELY YOUTHFUL DISPLAY OF YOUTHFULLNESS!!" he shouted, going into a 'Nice Guy' pose where the sun glinted off of his teeth. The smaller copy mimicked the pose. Naruto cringed, and he could feel Kyuubi rolling around, roaring in agony. Anko had a huge sweatdrop on the side of her face as she cleared her throat.

"Uh, Naruto, this is Maito Gai, Konoha's best taijutsu expert. The Hyuuga is Neji, we already know Tenten, and the mini Gai is Rock Lee." Anko introduced halfheartedly. Naruto looked a little sick when he observed the two clones still in that awful pose.

"They do this every day." Neji said in a careless tone. Lee frowned and looked at Neji.

"It is very unyouthful to criticize our flames of youth Neji!" Lee cried. The cogs in Naruto's brain were spinning furiously, and he suddenly came up with a cruel idea.

"Well just so you know Geji-mayu sensei and Bunshin (Bushy Brow Teacher and Clone), there is _one_ thing more powerful than your youth and enthusiasm." Naruto said the comment casually, but both Gai's and Lee's poses stopped right there and then and they stared at Naruto intently. Neji looked a little amused and Tenten was barely restraining her giggles. Anko was just smiling.

"What is this most unyouthful force that is greater than our youth and enthusiasm?" Lee asked, rapt with attention. Naruto grinned and began to cackle evilly. This continued for about a moment before he calmed down and answered menacingly:

"Old age and Treachery." He hissed. Gai and Lee looked horrified.

* * *

On the outskirts of Sunagakure, Gaara was strolling casually through a dune of sand. Taking a walk through the desert often provided him momentary peace of mind. As long as nothing disturbed him, he was quite content. Unfortunately, a scream echoed over the hills of sand this morning.

'NNOOOOOO! I HAVE NOT BELIEVED IN THE RIGHT SOURCE OF POWER! I MUST BECOME OLD AND TREACHEROUS!!!" was the surprisingly loud yell. Gaara rubbed his ears at the volume.

'_What the hell was that?'_ he thought to himself.

"**Can't help ya there, tanuki."** Was Shukaku's raspy reply.

**Chapter 3! R&R plz!**


	4. Elections Naruto

**A Swordsman's Road**

'**Dattebayo Networks' Presents: A SPECIAL NOTICE: "Elections Naruto"**

To all of my readers and reviewers:

As a few people have been saying about my stories (and I think so myself), they follow the original Naruto plotline a little too closely. So for this story, I'm going to mix up the Wave Arc a little bit. First thing's first, I want to change the main sword wielding villain. Here are your choices:

**First Choice:** Momochi Zabuza (Stays the same)

**Second Choice:** Hoshigaki Kisame (If he is chosen, the story is that he never joined the Akatsuki and one of the other Kiri Seven took his place.)

**Third Choice:** Kurosuki Raiga (That weird lookin' dude with the two little electric swords and the funeral fetish.)

The second thing I want to change is the chosen swordsman's subordinate. Once again, here are the candidates:

**First Choice:** Haku (Female)

**Second Choice:** Kaguya Kimmimaro

**Third Choice:** OC, probably a Jinchuriki (TWO X CHROMOSOMES (Female) ONLY!)

That concludes my message. See you next time on "Elections Naruto"!


	5. Kokushibyou

**A Swordsman's Road**

**Chapter 4: Kokushibyou**

**Well, here we are at the next chapter and the closing of the "Naruto Elections Campaign" As of June 26th, the results are in, and they are:**

Zabuza: 8 votes

Kisame: 19 votes

Raiga: 10 votes

Haku: 12 votes

Kimimaro: 14 votes

OC: 12 votes

**And to all of you, who lost the poll, worry not. I'm going to introduce Haku anyways. I **_**might**_** throw in the Jinchuriki OC for the Chuunin Exams if I feel like it.**

**Oh, and for anybody who has read my story "Master of Puppets, Demolition Chief" I have changed the rating to 'T', and the pairing is now NaruKin.**

* * *

Naruto had been enjoying himself for the past month or two. He and Anko-sensei had done about eight C-rank missions in the last month and a half. There was only one time where they had had to do a D-rank mission, and the end of it had been rather funny (Or at least to the crafty fox boy and the semi-insane snake woman):

Their D-rank mission was to capture the Daimyo's wife's cat Tora. The two swordsmen (Well, one swordsman and a swords_woman_) had caught the cat within an hour. Naruto had heard stories about this piece of vermin and whispered an idea to his sensei. She had grinned in an extremely evil way as she had set off a large explosion. The purpose of the explosion was to be an excuse for why one of the cat's feet were missing. Needless to say, Tora never ran away again for fear of being eaten by snakes.

Over the last month, Naruto had added a few more jutsus to his already impressive arsenal. One of them was Ninpo: Kanashibari no jutsu (Ninja Art: Temporary Paralysis Technique). This jutsu was extremely useful, and he often used it to help with the Tessenka no mai. The Shunshin no jutsu (Body Flicker Technique) was another not so useful technique that he had learned... when he first learned it. Kyuubi had seen to creating a better version of it, which Naruto used liberally. It was called the Genkitsune no jutsu (Fox Illusion Technique). It allowed him to temporarily increase the speed at which he moved by almost twelve fold, much like the Eight Gates, but without the side effects. He was so fast while using this technique that he left after images, and could partially control them with his chakra to confuse his enemy. An extremely useful technique. Anko had learned a couple of his jutsus and was working on perfecting the Yuukaku no mai. Hayate trained with them when he could, perfecting their technique and form. Or he would try learning some of the things that they came up with. Occasionally, the three of them would go stargazing out in a field of lavender on the west side of Konoha. Anko found this surprisingly enjoyable, for just lying around doing nothing. It especially helped them find peace of mind after a mission.

But a new aspect was now taking up Naruto's time: Tenten. True to his word, he would train with her and her team whenever he could. Rock Lee and Gai had been trying to become 'old and treacherous' after Naruto's little revelation. The first thing that they had done was trim their eyebrows. It had drastically changed their overall look, and even more so when they had redone their hair styles. Gai had changed his hair pattern to a simple draping style where his bangs partially obscured his eyes. Lee had gone for a spikier hairdo that resembled Naruto's slightly. Lee also wore a set of sunglasses to obscure his bug eyes. He had abandoned the green spandex suit for a simple blue tank top and a thin black vest. He wore black cargo pants, and grey leg warmers to cover his weights. Altogether, he looked like an average, not-so-crazy ninja. Gai dressed almost the same way, except he chose a dark crimson tank top and his Jounin vest instead of blue. He also wasn't as freakily scary as before.

Neji... wasn't so approachable. In Naruto's opinion, he was an egotistical, fatalistic, blind ass. He always maintained the opinion that he was superior to anyone, due to fate being kind to him. Naruto despised his guts because he acted like he was superior cuz' his daddy had died to save the Hyuuga Clan Head, Hiashi. What was worse was that he would always belittle people who lost to him, claiming that fate said they would lose. The first time he beat Naruto in a spar, he started to go on about dropouts being dropouts. Naruto had simply growled, and wrapped him up with Crocodylus, attempting a Tessenka no mai upon him. He had stopped Caduceus an inch from Neji's face, claiming that the next time it would be his eyes. Neji immediately shut his mouth about fate whenever Naruto was around.

Tenten was the person Naruto liked best on her team. She was the most normal of the team, and always good for a kenjutsu match or two. Naruto also started to spend more time with her outside of training and ninja related things. After spending a lot of time together, Naruto began to feel as if a piece of him had been taken away whenever Tenten had to leave. It was about three weeks after Gai and Lee's revelation that Naruto asked her out on a date. Tenten had stopped dead in her tracks at first, going blood red in the face before giggling madly and saying yes. Naruto had been overjoyed and had jumped up and down in excitement. He had calmed down and promised to pick her up around 6:30 to take her to a surprise dinner. He had dressed in a black shirt and pants with a nice jacket. When he had shown up to pick Tenten up, he had gotten a minor nosebleed. She was dressed in a light green kimono with a rose red obi that showed off her curves nicely. On her feet were a set of pumps that matched her obi. She had let her hair down, and put on a little bit of makeup on which brought out the beauty in her eyes and the rest of her face. Naruto had been starting to drool before Kyuubi saved his ass by yelling at him. Naruto had offered her his arm like a gentleman, causing her to blush and giggle again.

She had been thrilled when she saw that Naruto was taking her to the Jazz Club. The western style supper club had been built about a year ago, and was the hottest joint in Konoha. Also the most expensive.

"Naruto, how can you _afford_ to go here? My parents came here once, and came back with their wallets completely empty!" Tenten exclaimed. Naruto grinned at his date.

"Well, for the past month Anko-sensei and I have been doing C-rank missions. They actually pay fairly well. I've done about eight C-ranks and only ramen binged once, so we should be able to get in and eat just fine." Naruto responded with a smile. The smile was contagious, as one began to creep over her face as they entered the club.

"Do you two have a reservation?" asked the receptionist. She was an attractive woman in her early twenties with long black hair and grey eyes. She didn't change her expression when she saw Naruto, earning her a check for his 'People I won't prank too terribly' book.

"Uh, no. But will this do?" Naruto asked, pulling out a large wad of cash. Ryou symbols immediately appeared in the receptionist's eyes. She made a grab for the cash but Naruto pulled it away.

"To the seats first, choubanomono (Receptionist)." Naruto said to her. She nodded furiously and led them to a booth near the back of the club. The club was decorated with paintings from western Realist and Romantic artists, and the occasional odd sculpture. There was a band playing several odd instruments near them, and a large wooden dance floor to boot.

Naruto helped Tenten into her seat and sat down in his own, admiring the intimate setting. The lighting was soft, but still bright enough for the fancy establishment to not be considered dark. The two were attended to right away, and they began to discuss their respective lives. Tenten told Naruto that she had been born into a family without a lot of shinobi coming from it, mostly craftsmen for the shinobi. She told him how her mother had attempted to discourage her from becoming a shinobi, saying it was a man's job. Tenten had stubbornly not listened and defied her mother's wishes by enrolling in the ninja Academy. She had learned from her grandfather, a retired Jounin, how to use weapons to their greatest potential. She had said that her grandfather told her that she would do the Tsukiakari clan proud. By then, they had indulged in their dinners, occasionally feeding each other. Naruto brought Tenten up to speed with his life, starting with his lonely early childhood, enrolling in the Academy, failing the test and the subsequent beating up of Mizuki (Kyuubi transcendence excluded). He then told her of acquiring his swords, and his training under Hayate and Anko. Tenten was looking saddened and shocked that Naruto had been hated and shunned by the entire village for his entire life. When she asked why, he only told her that he couldn't tell her now, but promised to tell her later. She had reluctantly agreed to it. By then, Naruto was looking a little down in the dumps. Forming a clever plan, Tenten took one of the shrimp in his noodles and placed it in between her teeth. He immediately looked at her confusedly.

"You want it? Come and get it!" Tenten said to him, blushing. Naruto began to reach for the shrimp, but Tenten caught his wrist.

"And you can't use your hands." She instructed him. Naruto quickly saw where this was going, and turned red. He slowly leaned over the table and took the shrimp delicately with his teeth. He knew what his date wanted him to do, and he didn't want to disappoint her. He gently brushed her full lips with his own, causing her eyes to widen. Naruto let his lips linger for a moment before he pulled away with the shrimp in his mouth.

"Mmm; spiced shrimp with a hint of strawberry." Naruto remarked to his tomato-red date. He laughed softly as she began to sputter indignantly. He picked up another shrimp and stuck it in between his teeth. Tenten giggled and snatched it away with her painted nails. Naruto pouted cutely, and Tenten was almost tempted to squeal 'Kawaii!'

"You were supposed to not use your hands!" Naruto whined like a little child, sticking his bottom lip out. Tenten giggled like a little schoolgirl. She was about to say something else when the band began to play a slow, romantic sounding song. Tenten rose from her seat, and dragged Naruto with her.

"I can't dance Tenten." Naruto told her sadly. Tenten shook her head as she instructed him on what to do. He hesitantly placed a hand around her hourglass waist, and took her other hand in his own. She placed her hand on his shoulder, and began to steer them in a slow circle as the music played.

_There's a calm surrender_

_To the rush of day._

_When the heat of a rolling world_

_Can't be turned away._

_An enchanted moment,_

_And it sees me through._

_It's enough for this restless warrior_

_Just to be with you._

Tenten had been looking into Naruto's gorgeous azure eyes until the final line. After that, as if on impulse, she leaned into Naruto and rested her head on his chest. The blonde was shocked at first, but he laid his head on top of her own.

_And can you feel the love tonight._

_It is where we are._

_It's enough for this wide eyed wanderer_

_That we got this far._

_And can you feel the love tonight._

_How it's laid to rest_

_It's enough to make kings and vagabonds_

_Believe the very best._

Naruto felt like nobody could reach the two of them as they danced together. Tenten almost felt like she was meant to fit in his arms. Naruto blushed as his imagination and tenant filled his head with rather... ecchi images of Tenten in his arms. Tenten was thinking similarly. She marveled at how he seemed to be the right size to hold her, and began to enjoy the dance even more.

_There's a time for everyone_

_If they only learn_

_That the twisting kaleidoscope_

_Moves us all in turn._

_There's a rhyme and reason_

_To the wild outdoors_

_When the heart of this star crossed voyager_

_Beats in time with yours._

Kyuubi had been speaking to Naruto, saying he knew this song. He began to nag at Naruto to do something, to which Naruto reluctantly agreed. When the third line in the second verse of the bridge of the song played, Naruto took Tenten's hand and laid it over his heart. When the fourth line played, he switched their hand positions and laid his hand over her heart. Tenten's eyes widened at his action. Her eyes began to fill with happy tears as she realized what he was implying.

_And can you feel the love tonight?_

_It is where we are._

_It's enough for this wide-eyed wanderer_

_That we got this far._

Tenten buried her face into Naruto's chest as she tried to hold back crying out of happiness; Naruto loved her. It took her a moment to look up and stare into his bright blue eyes with her now teary brown ones. Naruto smiled happily as he discerned what that gaze meant; 'I love you too.'

_And can you feel the love tonight?_

_How it's laid to rest_

_It's enough to make kings and vagabonds_

_Believe the very best._

_(Repeat once and fade)_

As the song ended, Naruto and Tenten were content to hold each other for a moment. Several couples cast a suspicious look or two at them as the two newfound lovers embraced each other. They broke apart and walked back to their chairs, holding hands the whole way. When they sat down Tenten gave Naruto a watery smile, tears dripping down her pretty face.

"D-did you (sniff) mean it Naruto-kun?" Tenten choked out. Naruto smiled even wider when Tenten added the '-kun' suffix to his name.

"Hai Tenten-chan; aishiteru (I love you)." Naruto replied softly. Tenten sniffed once more as she leaned across the table to give him a gentle kiss. Naruto closed his eyes and enjoyed every last second of it. After a moment, Tenten broke the kiss and informed Naruto that she should be getting back to home due to her team being assigned a C-rank mission. Naruto left the appropriate amount of money on the table- plus a tip- and walked Tenten home. Said bun-haired girl was practically attached to Naruto's arm the whole way home. Once they reached the porch, Tenten again locked lips with Naruto for several minutes. They broke apart and gazed into each other's eyes.

"Goodnight Naruto-kun. Thanks for a great time tonight." Tenten whispered softly as she hugged Naruto again.

"Thank you Ten-chan. Goodnight and good luck on your C-rank tomorrow." Naruto murmured back as he stroked her silky hair. Both of them looked each other in the eyes and smiled happily when they both read what each other were trying to say. Tenten slipped out of Naruto's grasp and entered her house. Naruto began to drift home, floating on Cloud Nine.

* * *

Anko noticed something was up with Naruto the next day. He seemed to be carrying himself a little higher, and she could tell that the smile on his face was genuine. It wasn't one of those fake smiles that he and she herself used all the time. This was a genuine, happy smile. Something good had happened to the kid. Anko wanted to find out.

"Oi, 'Ruto! What's got you in such a good mood?" Anko asked. Naruto shook his head and stared at his sensei. The look in his eyes told her that he was trying to think of something, before they set onto an answer.

"Oh I got myself a girlfriend, that's all." Naruto retorted with a dreamy smile. Anko raised one of her eyebrows before a grin graced her face.

"Well congrats kid; you're movin' up in the world. So who is she? Is she hot? Where'd you take her? Did you get to any bases?" Anko blurted out. Naruto raised his eyebrow at the volley of questions.

"Tsukiakari Tenten, yes, the Jazz Club, and First Base." Naruto answered all four of the questions in one sentence. Anko then did something _extremely_ uncharacteristic of her: she squealed like a schoolgirl. Cue sweatdrop on Naruto and Kyuubi's part.

"Awww! That is so CUTE! The cute little bun-haired weapons girl and the master swordsman! Such a perfect pair!" Anko squealed. Naruto's sweatdrop was getting bigger and bigger.

"Uh... are you feelin' okay sensei? You're kinda actin' crazier than normal." Naruto told his sensei. It took a tenth of a second for Anko to realize what she had done and scream in horror. Naruto covered his ears and cringed in agony; his sensei screamed loudly.

"I CAN'T BELIEVE THAT I JUST DID THAT! BAD ANKO! BAD, _BAD_ ANKO!!" she began to bang her head on a tree as she said "Bad Anko!" Naruto proceeded to laugh his ass off until Anko stopped.

"Well kid, I figured we'd just do some light kenjutsu today and maybe exchange a jutsu or two. I've been trying to get us a higher ranked mission, and the old man said that he'd try and find us something." Naruto smirked. One of the things that he loved about having Anko as his sensei was that he didn't have to be polite all the time. He just knew that if he were on a team with Sakura that she would try and smack him over the head every time he said 'Hokage-Ojiji' or 'Ojiisan' Naruto nodded as he pulled Crocodylus out. Anko was devious, and he would prefer to keep her at a distance, or at least on her toes. Crocodylus gave him that leverage. Whereas Caduceus was lighter, and therefore faster, it did not lend him range without having to pause for hand seals.

* * *

Naruto was a little winded from the chakra drainage, but Kyuubi and Caduceus were rapidly refilling his reserves. Anko was sweating and panting something fierce. His and Anko's 'light' kenjutsu training had more or less turned the training ground into a war zone. Huge craters littered the once green field, blackened stumps dotted the grounds, and small fires still burned. But he had beaten Anko, and their win tally was now at a tie of twelve to twelve. After the match, Anko had taught Naruto the Sen'eitajashu (Hidden Shadow Many Snakes Hand), and he had taught her the Kaze no Yaiba (Blade of Wind). She was still having a little bit of trouble with it, as it required a lot of chakra. She had the control part down, just not quite the capacity. She dismissed Naruto and told him to be in the Hokage's office at 7:30 AM tomorrow. He promptly launched himself into the air with the help of his Kaze Suihou, and using a small breeze, glided through Konoha. He felt so free when he was flying; he didn't have to put up with the stares, comments and beatings of the villagers, although the latter problem rarely happened anymore. As he sailed through the sky, he began to eye the training grounds. As he flew over the ground that held the KIA stone, he spotted the thing that he hated with a burning, fiery passion that was hot enough to melt lead:

Uchiha Sasuke with his team of Haruno Sakura and Chuuken Mato. They were currently listening to that cycloptic Jounin with the orange book that had come to watch him and Hayate fight. Naruto grinned when he saw the team get ready for a sparring match. Mato faced Sasuke, a neutral expression on his plain face. Sasuke looked bored and angsty (As usual). Sakura was watching her emo idol with stars in her eyes. The cyclops was reading his book. Naruto stopped circling and began a slow descent to the south side of the training ground. He landed quietly in the trees as he observed the spar. Sasuke and Mato seemed to be equal, both blocking every kick and punch. Eventually, Sasuke started with the Katon jutsu, and Mato used a Doton jutsu to block the attack, and brought the wall down on Sasuke, who executed some impressive acrobatics to dodge the falling debris. With his opening presented, Mato charged in and delivered a powerful punch to Sasuke's face. The Uchiha stumbled a little, but pulled out a kunai to block Mato's dagger. The two continued to fight with their sharp weapons for a couple of minutes until Sasuke pulled off a clever little trick of letting Mato stab him through the belly. It turned out to be a Kawarimi, and Mato couldn't pull his dagger out in time to stop Sasuke from placing a kunai to his throat. Sakura (naturally) started to fawn over and praise the black haired prick until Mato yelled at her to shut up. Their sensei called for a huddle.

"Okay, good work you two. Mato that was a good strategy you used with the Doryuuheki (Earth Style Wall). Sasuke, your taijutsu-"

"Was sloppy." remarked a voice from the trees. The three Genin whipped around to find the voice's owner. No sooner had they turned around than Konoha's favourite blonde ninja jumped out of the trees and extended a set of wings on his back. He floated down and landed gracefully on the ground, staring at Team Seven.

"Sasuke, I could see three flaws in your taijutsu form throughout the spar. There were also two times where you left yourself open enough for a faster, higher level nin to get a kunai in under your guard." Naruto criticized to an angry looking Sasuke. Sakura naturally came to her idol's aid.

"Naruto-baka, stop criticizing Sasuke-kun! You of all people should know better to do that, you _DOBE!_" Sakura screamed at him. Naruto looked rather dazed and confused as he stared at the pink-haired banshee. He looked at the cyclops questioningly.

"Uh, did you understand what this thing just said? I don't speak howler monkey." Naruto said to the cycloptic Jounin, who promptly giggled. Mato was covering his mouth and Sakura was seething. Sasuke was curious and wanted some answers.

"Dobe." He said to Naruto who promptly ignored him. "Dobe!" Sasuke raised his voice a bit. He was still ignored. "DOBE!" Sasuke yelled. Naruto looked at the Uchiha.

"Do you have an imaginary friend teme? Cuz I don't know anybody who has that moniker around the village." Naruto taunted. Sasuke clenched his fists and ground his teeth. Naruto swore he saw a blade of grass wilt from the angst and anger radiating off of the raven-haired Uchiha.

'_Sheesh, I hope he doesn't use that as a weapon.'_ Naruto thought with a shudder.

"Fine... _Naruto_," Sasuke spat his name like it tasted bad. "where did you get those swords and learn how to fly?" Sasuke asked. A barely perceptible grin formed on Naruto's face.

"I will gladly give you that information, _Uchiha_." Naruto spat Sasuke's clan name like a curse. Sasuke smirked... but it didn't last. "But it will cost you. If you want that info, you have to teach me one of your jutsu that we didn't learn in the Academy. If you do, I _might_ consider telling you where I got these." Naruto explained, smirking when he saw Sasuke sputter slightly.

"That's completely unfair." Sasuke stated, crossing his arms.

"Fine; no deal." Naruto said and shrugged as he turned away. Enraged, Sasuke threw a kunai at Naruto's head. The blonde turned and deflected the kunai by gracefully drawing one of his swords. Sasuke charged at him, a pair of kunai drawn.

"Sasuke-kun! Yamete!" Sakura cried, looking nervous. The black-haired Uchiha ignored her and swung at Naruto with his left kunai. Naruto deflected the kunai with an almost bored look on his face. Sasuke continued to swing his kunais at Naruto, who either dodged or half-heartedly blocked them. With every missed attempt to hit the blonde, Sasuke grew angrier.

"How did you get so good?!" Sasuke cried as he tried to scissor-slash Naruto, who simply ducked the attack. Naruto smiled lazily at the Uchiha prodigy.

"I work hard, get plenty of rest, and learn from a psycho of a sensei. What else is there to say?" Naruto responded in a bored and distant tone. Now totally pissed, Sasuke ran through a set of seals that ended with the tiger.

"Katon: Gōkakyū no jutsu!" (Fire Release: Grand Fireball Technique) Sasuke announced as he blew a huge fireball of death from his mouth.

"Futon: Daitoppa!" (Wind Release: Great Breakthrough) Naruto countered. The huge blast of wind rocketed forward and snuffed out the fireballs. Sasuke was thrown backwards and landed on his ass gracelessly about twenty feet away. The avenger got up and charged at the blonde with surprising speed. To his confusion and slight satisfaction, the blonde didn't move. Sasuke presumed it to be out of fear.

"Scared dobe?" Sasuke taunted with his patented smirk on his face. The blonde's face was calm.

"Not in the slightest, SasUKE." Naruto emphasized the last syllable in Sasuke's name rather forcefully. This made the Uchiha one jump closer to blowing his stack. He knew that the after-affects of this next move would come and bite him on the ass later, but he didn't care. The dobe had to be beaten.

"Katon: Karyū Endan!" (Fire Release: Fire Dragon Flame Missile) Sasuke shouted as he exhaled a ray of whitish flames from his mouth. The flames took the shape of a dragon and charged at Naruto, who was running through his own seals extremely fast.

"Futon: Hyogufu no jutsu!" (Wind Release: Freezing Tornado Technique) Naruto shouted as he jumped into the air. Out of nowhere, an almost bluish tornado surrounded Naruto and protected him from the fire dragon. Sasuke, who was panting from the chakra expenditure of his last attack, stared on in shock and anger.

'_How does he do it? Where did he find this power? That dobe doesn't deserve this kind of power! I should be the one to have it!'_ Sasuke raged inwardly. The steam from the two attacks colliding had cleared, and Naruto was just standing there calmly, watching a bird pass by. Using his distraction, Sasuke charged with his remaining strength. He fully intended to maim Naruto to an inch of his life to learn his secrets. As Sasuke approached Naruto, the blonde looked at him with a bored expression and held out his right arm.

"Sen'eijashu!" Naruto stated before four large pythons flew out of his sleeve and ensnared Sasuke. Kakashi looked a little disturbed at the jutsu that Naruto had used, Mato was looking surprised, and everyone's favourite (or not so favourite) pink-haired howler monkey was looking completely horrified: 'her' Sasuke-kun had been bested.

"Well, well, looks like you get to learn two valuable lessons in the aftermath of this match Sasuke: One, the 'dobe' always triumphs. Two, anger clouds your judgment and fuels weakness. If your brother told you to live a life of hate, he was telling you that so that you would _never_ be able to stop him. You are one of the few people who will be able to stand a chance against Itachi. _Do not_ be a puppet and play by his rules." Naruto said to the still bound Uchiha with a cold expression. Naruto turned from the avenger and jumped into the air, rocketing forwards from his Kaze Suihou and his cape/wing. Sasuke was simply lying there, still bound by snakes, contemplating the blonde's words.

'_Is that what I've been doing? Playing as Itachi's puppet...?'_

* * *

Naruto had just entered the Hokage tower with five minutes to go before he was expected. As he ascended the stairs and stopped outside the Hokage's office, he was greeted with the sight of both his senseis waiting to gain entrance.

"Hayate-sensei! What are you doing here?" Naruto asked, bounding up to his previous sensei. Hayate turned and looked at Naruto with a smile.

"Cough- I was called here because- cough- I'm going to be going on a mission- cough- with you and Anko." Hayate replied. The last word had barely left his mouth when the doors to the Hokage's office opened and a Genin team walked out. The Jounin resembled the Hokage, minus a few years. He wore the standard Jounin outfit, blue suit and green vest, but on his hands were a set of what appeared to be brass knuckles with blades on them. He also had a cigarette hanging from his mouth. His team consisted of (as Naruto liked to call them) Yamanaka Ino (Envy (previously Lust)), Nara Shikamaru (Sloth), and Akimichi Chouji (Gluttony). Why Naruto referred to them as three of the Seven Deadly Sins, he couldn't figure out. They just seemed to fit. All three of them looked at Naruto in disbelief (Envy), mild interest (Sloth), or confusion (Gluttony).

"Oi dobe, when did you graduate? And what's with the weird hitai-ate?" demanded the blond-haired sinner. Naruto looked at her calmly.

"I graduated after I kicked the shit out of Mizuki-yaro (bastard) and stopped him from taking the Kinjiru Sukuro-ru (Forbidden Scroll). And this is a Tatsujin Hitai-ate: a hitai-ate only given to individuals who the Hokage holds in high regard. This is the last one in the village; the other three that were made in here belong to the Konoha Sannin." Naruto answered coolly, arms crossed. The three 'sins' looked rather stunned at the information. Their sensei was looking at them sternly.

"Show some respect you three. If there's one thing I particularly dislike, it is people who denounce people that my father holds in high regards." The Jounin reprimanded. 'Envy' 'Sloth' and 'Gluttony' winced at their sensei's tone. The man turned to Naruto and grinned as he held out his hand.

"Sarutobi Asuma." Asuma introduced himself as Naruto shook his hand.

"Do I really need to introduce myself?" Naruto asked, raising an eyebrow.

"Nah, I know you; the swordsman that kicked Konoha's best's ass halfway to the moon." Asuma replied, and Anko and Naruto laughed while Hayate scowled. The other three Genin were about to start questioning Naruto, but the Hokage called them in. Shrugging, Naruto strode briskly into the office before any questions could be asked. Anko and Hayate followed him and stood at attention before the Hokage.

"Well Anko, you wanted a higher level mission, and you got one. Although, this is the only one I could get you below S-rank, but it is still quite dangerous. The mission I have assigned you is an A-rank mission." Sarutobi explained. Naruto and Anko's eyes widened, and Hayate raised one of his eyebrows.

"Cough- If I may ask Hokage-sama, why am- cough- I here?" the sickly looking man asked politely. Sarutobi took a puff of his pipe and gazed at the man.

"Because, Hayate-kun, this mission is one that absolutely requires professional swordspersons. Naruto-kun grew much under your tutelage, and Anko, I am assuming that Naruto has also taught you some kenjutsu?" Anko nodded. "Good, this is the mission dossier: Yesterday, Team Nine left on a C-rank mission to escort the bridge builder Tazuna back to the Wave Country. Several hours into their mission, they were apprehended by the Onikyodai (Demon Brothers), Chuunin level nukenin of Kirigakure. It was only then that Tazuna divulged that he was being targeted by the Gato Syndicate which has Wave Country in its grasp." Sarutobi paused to take a breath. "Tazuna said that he was being targeted to prevent the bridge to the mainland that he is trying to build to be completed. If the bridge is completed, Gato's hold on Wave Country will be crippled and destroyed. That immediately bumped the mission up to at least B-rank. The day later, Team Nine was again opposed. But this opponent was a much more dangerous foe. He was Hoshigaki Kisame, an S-rank swordsman from Kiri, and ex-member of the Kiri Seven. Team Nine was able to hold him off and incapacitate him. They were about to finish him when an oinin came along, knocked him out, and took his body away. The Team Nine Jounin sent a distress letter back, regarding his suspicions that the oinin and Kisame were working together. They have requested backup, specifically shinobi with skills in swords: namely, you three." Sarutobi finished, looking gravely at the two Jounin and single Genin in front of him. Hayate and Anko were shocked. They had heard of Hoshigaki Kisame before. He was a ninja who had fought tooth and scale **(Sorry, I just had to make that pun)** through an entire army to assassinate the Water Country's Daimyo. He had also attempted to murder the Sandaime Mizukage. He claimed that it was for Kirigakure's good, seeing as the Sandaime Mizukage was and still is a tyrant. Naruto had heard a little bit about Kisame, but a question popped into his head.

"Ojiisan, if there are S-rank nukenin in the question, why isn't this mission S-rank?" Naruto asked. Anko and Hayate were a little surprised that Naruto caught onto that detail.

"It has been decreased to A-rank because there are so many ninja on this mission. Now, enough questions! Pack what you will need for a two week-long mission. Leave anything that can be left behind. You are to leave from the east gate in one hour. Dismissed." The three walked briskly out of the room to prepare for their mission.

* * *

It was four hours later, and the three sword-wielding ninja were darting east through the trees, heading for Wave. They had been going at a brisk pace, but Naruto was using his Kaze Suihou to push them forwards much faster. Little to no conversation was held as they traversed through the trees.

It was about three hours later when they reached the warm, sunny beach of Fire Country. The sun beat down upon the shore as small waves crashed onto the shore. Naruto let a content smile grace his face as a light breeze passed.

"Sorry to bust your moment of peace there Naruto, but we've gotta figure out how to get to Wave. In case you haven't noticed, we don't have a boat." Anko pointed out. Hayate sweatdropped and bowed his head. Naruto shook his head with a 'tsk' noise.

"What are you 'tsking' about gaki?" Anko snapped at him. Naruto looked at his sensei with a smirk before he bit his thumb, reeled off some seals, and yelled "Kuchiyose no jutsu!" there was a huge explosion of smoke that obscured the two Jounins' vision. When it cleared, Naruto was standing on top of a large sarcosuchus **(A.N.: Also called 'the Super Croc', the sarcosuchus was an ancient crocodile that was close to 50 feet long. Thank you for this idea DJ Rodriguez.)** It was a dark green with a small tint of blue in its scales. Its smaller teeth were as large as a tanto, and its biggest teeth were almost half as long as Caduceus. The huge crocodile swung its armoured head around and tried to look at Naruto.

"You called, master?" its voice was hoarse and hissing, but it was deep and booming, shaking the area around it.

"Yes I did. My colleagues and I need to get across the ocean to reach Wave Country, and we were hoping you could take us there." Naruto answered as Anko and Hayate jumped up onto the huge crocodile. The huge crocodile slowly dragged itself into the water and began to beat its tail at a steady pace, propelling them quickly through the water. Naruto sat down on one of the sarcosuchus' smooth scales and sighed. He brightened before he reached into one of his inner vest pockets and pulled out a deck of cards.

"You three want a game?" Naruto asked his superiors. Anko smirked, and Hayate just shrugged as he sat down. Naruto opened the package and began to shuffle the deck.

"What's the- cough- game?" Hayate asked. Naruto looked at his senseis calmly. An evil grin spread across his face that neither Anko nor Hayate liked one bit.

"Strip poker." He answered as he dished out the cards.

* * *

Two hours later, the 'Crocodile Convoy' was approaching the shores of Wave Country. The game was not quite finished, but the stakes were high. Naruto was down to his cape and boxers with a rather calm look on his face. Hayate had discarded his top, but still had his pants on. Anko was down to her trench coat and her dark purple panties. The three sword masters drew two cards each, and laid several down on the flat scale that was their 'table'. The cards were a Queen, King, and Ace of Hearts with a Seven of Clubs and a Two of Spades. Anko and Hayate looked at their cards, the ones at the table, and grinned microscopically. Naruto's face remained calm as they laid down the cards.

"Aces high." Anko stated, throwing down her Ace of Clubs, and Two of Diamonds.

"Two Pair." Hayate replied, displaying his Seven of Diamonds and Ace of Spades. Both Jounin looked expectantly at Naruto. The blonde Genin sat there, perfectly still for a moment. Then he looked up from his cards, smiled maniacally, and laid them down.

"Straight Flush." Naruto drawled, laying down a Ten and a Jack of Hearts. Anko and Hayate's eyes became white and pupil less, and their mouths dropped to the ground. Naruto began to laugh uproariously.

"Pay up and strip down _suckers_." Naruto sneered at them. Anko and Hayate begrudgingly handed over 5000 ryou each, and removed another article of clothing. The 5000 ryou was to be given to anybody who had gotten a Flush of any kind. Anko discarded her panties and crossed her legs, and Hayate took off his pants. Naruto snickered when he saw the pattern of little suns wearing shades. Hayate blushed out of embarrassment. They were about to start another round when the sarcosuchus announced that they had reached the shore. The three quickly put their clothes back on, strapped their sword(s) onto their belts or backs, and jumped off of the sarcosuchus which vanished in a blast of smoke. The three sword masters began to move at top speed towards their destination.

It was about an hour later that the group of three came upon an unmistakable battleground. The ground was sodden; the unmistakable sign of Suiton jutsu. There were scratch marks on trees and in the ground. But they were grouped in little clusters, unlike a normal sword. Anko and Hayate of course knew why these scratch marks were like that. Naruto didn't, but remained silent. There were also craters and the occasional burn mark in the ground. Amongst a couple of discarded kunai, Naruto could've sworn that he saw a sharp-looking little bone.

"Looks like a pretty intense battle went on here." Hayate remarked, eyes narrowed.

"Yeah. Keep your guard up; I have a feeling that we might get some company." Naruto responded, laying his hand on Crocodylus' pommel. Anko slid Murasaki out of its sheath so that a small portion of the blade was showing. Hayate's grip on Gengetsu visibly strengthened as they walked on. They walked for about half an hour, silent and ready to strike. Nothing was happening, but they didn't want to be careless.

"**Kit."** Kyuubi spoke suddenly. Naruto resisted the urge to jump out of his skin.

'_What the hell fox?! You couldn't have given me a little warning before you shortened my lifespan a couple of years?'_ Naruto asked rather peevishly.

"**Okay, sorry. Sheesh, chill out kit."** Kyuubi drawled back.

'_What do you want anyways?'_ Naruto asked, eyeing his superiors warily.

"**I just remembered; the labyrinth where I keep my sword is nearby here. I could take you to it if you want."** Kyuubi explained to him. Naruto stopped dead in his tracks.

'_A sword? Why would _you_ of all demons need a sword?'_ Naruto asked, perturbed.

"**When I was too lazy to swing my tails around, or wanted to cause some small time destruction when I was in my human form, I used this sword. I had it forged for me in the depths of Hell. There are many spells and curses upon it, probably making it one of the strongest weapons ever created."** Kyuubi explained. Anko and Hayate were now looking at Naruto worriedly. Naruto stood still for another second, and looked up a second later. The two Jounin recoiled as they stared into the red eyes of the Kyuubi. They both drew their swords and held them at ready, but Naruto/Kyuubi looked to his right and took off running incredibly fast. The two Jounin took off after him with some difficulty.

About five minutes later, Naruto stopped in a small clearing. There was no vegetation on the ground, just plain, black, scorched earth. In the centre of the clearing was a large stone shaped like a throne with a creepy looking demon coiling around it. Sitting on the edge of its tongue was a large black crystal with a small hole in it.

"**Okay kit, cut your finger and let it drip into the hole in that crystal."** Kyuubi instructed. Naruto pricked his thumb on his elongated canine and let a drop of blood fall into the small hole. The tongue immediately recoiled and the demon statue crawled slowly to the top of the throne. The throne split open, revealing a small staircase. Naruto descended the staircase, Jounin in pursuit. The staircase was dark, lit occasionally by a faint white torch. It seemed like forever before Naruto reached the bottom of the stairs.

'_Kyuubi, how far down are we?'_ Naruto asked, looking around.

"**Last I remembered this labyrinth was about half a kilometre down. Mind you, this was about a thousand years ago."** Kyuubi replied. Naruto whistled as he continued into the cavern. Anko and Hayate were following nervously. Naruto was told by the fox to ignore them. A few moments later, a red glow dimly lit the hall they were walking through. It was also starting to get hotter. Soon afterwards, the reason for the light and heat was revealed:

Naruto/Kyuubi arrived in another cavern. This one had a huge lake of magma in it. Large satanic heads lined the walls, spewing the molten rock. On the other side of the lake, there was a huge black door.

"**Don't freak out kit; this is just like walking on water... you just gotta use more chakra so your shoes don't get burned."** Kyuubi added as an afterthought. Naruto gulped as he gathered chakra to his feet. He had gathered twice as much chakra as necessary, and closed his eyes as he stepped out onto the lake of fiery death. When nothing happened, he opened his eyes and looked at his feet. He was relieved to see a tiny sheet of blue chakra separating him from the magma. Naruto turned back to his senseis and told them what they had to do before he darted across the lava. He waited patiently for his senseis before he continued past obstacles like bottomless pits, snake pits, crocodile pits, the list went on.

'_Sheesh Kyuu, you really like the 'Pits of Death' thing eh?'_ Naruto asked exasperatedly.

"**Can you blame me? NO!"** Kyuubi replied. Naruto just rolled his eyes until he came upon a huge, elevated pool in the shape of a topless dome. But the water was not water; it was blood. Naruto sniffed in disdain at the scent of the fetid liquid.

"**You're gonna have to swim to the bottom of this pool if you want my sword kit."** Kyuubi said to him. Shaking his head, Naruto put on the goggles he always kept (just in case), pinched his nose, and dove into the blood pool. Anko and Hayate were now ghost white and sweating from having to cross all of the 'Pits of Doom'. Hayate was deathly afraid of Scarab Beetles, and Anko was terrified of Fire Ants. Neither of them wanted to take their chances in that pool of red liquid.

It seemed as though an eternity had passed before Naruto's arm shot out of the pool. The blonde ninja clambered out of the red liquid, still drenched in it. He turned back to the pool and pulled hard on something. Hayate was the first to notice that it was a huge handle that was almost as large as Naruto's fist. Naruto yanked the rest of whatever it was out of the pool and stood it up. Only then did Anko and Hayate recognize the object as an enormous sheathed sword that stood slightly taller than Naruto. The blonde unsheathed the blade, and three gasps echoed around the cave. The blade was shaped like a huge, curved kitchen knife with a large spine jutting out backwards from the unsharpened side. The blade was black at the top, but there was a flame pattern on the bottom three quarters of the blade that was actually waving like a real flame. In the centre of the blade was a strange slit that looked like an eyelid **(For those of you who are having trouble seeing this image, imagine Soul Edge as a kitchen knife with a crest at the back of it.)**. Unintentionally, Naruto said the name of the sword.

"Kokushibyou." (Black Death) Naruto whispered as he raised the huge sword above his head with some difficulty. The cave began to glow a blinding white, and all three ninja felt like they were being crushed by iron bars. As soon as that feeling had started, it stopped and the light faded to reveal that they were right outside that large stone throne that they had descended to find this weapon. Naruto slid the huge sword over his back with the belt attachment that came with it and looked over at his stunned senseis.

"Uh, correct me if I'm wrong, but I think that we have a place to be right now."

* * *

Several hours of grueling travel later, the three swordsmen reached the address of the bridge builder named Tazuna. Naruto knocked softly on the door, and he could hear the shuffling of feet inside. An attractive woman with dark blue hair and a stern-looking but pretty face opened the door. One of her eyebrows rose upwards as she took in the odd sight of a sickly looking young man, a creepy purple-haired chick, and a blonde boy carrying two swords and a huge zanbatou.

"Can I help you three?" she asked the group.

"Uh, we're the- cough- reinforcements that were requested for- cough- this mission." Hayate explained. The woman's eyes widened in recognizance.

"Oh, of course! Please come in." she stepped aside and allowed the three of them into the house. It wasn't too shabby, but not exactly ritzy either, Naruto thought as he examined the house. The woman directed them to the kitchen, where they were greeted by...

"Lee! Neji-teme! Gai-sensei! Tenten-chan! So _you're_ the team we have to bail out!" Naruto exclaimed. Neji scowled, Gai and Lee grinned, and Tenten brightened. She jumped up and gave him a hug.

"Good to see you Naruto-kun." Tenten replied, muffled slightly from being pressed into her boyfriend's chest. The rest of the house's occupants were staring slack-jawed as the two lovebirds embraced each other. After they broke apart, the three swordsmen sat down at the table. The old man who Naruto suspected was Tazuna was about to apologize for not having more food, but Naruto silenced him when he summoned the equivalent of a small banquet from a scroll and heated it with a small Katon jutsu. The seven nin and three clients dug into the feast like there was no tomorrow. Once Naruto broke out the desert, they began to discuss the incident with Kisame and the oinin that Gai suspected was working with him. The three swordsmen listened in silence, occasionally putting in a comment or two about where or when Kisame would strike next. Finally, Tenten dropped the bomb:

"Where did you get that huge sword Naruto-kun?" she asked, eyeing the sword rather apprehensively. The entire household's other occupants (Naruto's senseis excluded), were listening and watching intently.

"... I bought it from a traveler who was passing through Konoha the other day and decided to try and test it for this mission, should an opportunity be presented." Naruto explained, running his fingers along Kokushibyou's rough hilt. Neji had turned his Byakugan on, and was examining the sword.

"I sense a great evil coming from this blade. What inspired you to pick it of the others that could have been chosen?" Neji asked, turning his piercing gaze to Naruto who regarded the Hyuuga calmly.

"Have you ever heard the phrase 'The sword chooses its master' Neji?" Naruto asked. Neji nodded slowly. "Well, Kokushibyou chose me. Whenever a sword rejects its user, it just doesn't seem to feel right when you swing it. Even if the swing is perfect, the sword always seems too light or heavy. When a sword chooses its user, a funny feeling comes over the user, like its going to rain or something. I got this feeling as soon as I touched Kokushibyou, meaning that I was destined to wield the Sword of Death." Everyone was silent and holding their breath as they gazed at Naruto's new blade.

"The Sword of _Death_?" Lee repeated, not in his usually annoyingly polite way. "Why is it called that?" he continued. Naruto listened to a suggestion from the fox, and repeated it.

"It's called that because anybody who sees this sword out of its sheath is as good as dead." Naruto answered as he calmly dug into a chicken thigh.

"Why?" came a small voice. Naruto looked up and eyed the small boy in overalls and a hat that he assumed was Tsunami's son. He had a defeated and angry look in his eyes.

"Why do you try so hard? No matter how tough you are Gato will win! When the strong fight the weak, the weak are always crushed!" the boy's voice rose near the end. Tsunami and Tazuna were looking embarrassed and upset. Team Gai and two of the three swordsmen were looking at the boy bewilderedly. Naruto simply stared at him coolly.

"And what makes you say that kid? Did your father die while protecting this country from Gato's takeover?" Naruto asked quizzically. Anger replaced by surprise, the boy nodded slowly.

"Well kid, let me tell you something. Your father was doing something very admirable, so his death was not in vain. He was fighting for a goal, no, an _ideal_. That ideal... was freedom." Naruto said in an almost sagely way to the small boy, whose face was changing from disdain to astonishment. The other occupants of the table were all listening spellbound to Naruto's words.

"Your father thought much the same way I do. Except he didn't have this exact personal philosophy: Shinja (Believe). What it means is that if you believe in something, it is always possible. I believe that I can become one of the greatest ninja in existence, and that my name will be immortalized forever. Tenten-chan believes that she can become like her idol, Tsunade of the Sannin. Both Lee and Gai believe that hard work will surpass genius. All of these things are possible... because they _believe_ they are." Naruto told the small boy, whose eyes were wide in astonishment. Anko whistled in a low tone.

"That's deep Naruto. But it's true gaki. You can accomplish anything if you believe in it." She said to the boy. Said child stared at them for a moment before excusing himself from the table. Naruto watched him go for a second before redirecting his attention to the large ramen bowl he had brought in the scroll.

'_I still gotta figure out how the scroll keeps the contents of certain things from spilling...'_

* * *

Naruto blocked a strike from Tenten, and countered with his own vertical, upwards slash. She dodged and countered with a flurry of stabs. Naruto backflipped away, and landed on a tree branch while running through a short list of seals.

"Futon: Renkudan!" Naruto announced his second favourite jutsu as he launched the chakra hardened bullet of wind at his girlfriend. Tenten gracefully twisted out of the way, and launched several kunai and shuriken at Naruto. Naruto brought the handles of his two swords together and spun them rapidly. They managed to deflect all of the projectiles, but that was what Tenten had been planning. While she was good at using weapons and close range armed combat, she didn't have a great deal of jutsus in her arsenal. But the jutsu that she did have were nothing to be sneezed at.

"Katon: Gōkakyū no jutsu!" Tenten stated as she shot a large fireball at Naruto. The fireball was not as large as some of the other Gōkakyū no jutsus Naruto had seen, but it was still formidable. Naruto dove off of the branch before it was incinerated and threw a handful of shuriken at Tenten. She blocked them with a sweeping motion, but the feeble attack served to momentarily distract her so Naruto could get close to her.

"Tsubaki no mai!" Naruto announced, beginning a flurry of thrusts and stabs. Tenten was barely able to block or evade his attacks, he was moving so fast. Unfortunately, she put too much speed into blocking one of his strikes, and was not able to move her sword back in time to block the stab that barely nicked her left shoulder. Still, Crocodylus was deep enough into her skin to draw blood; if only a little bit. Tenten winced, the cut stung a little bit. Naruto saw her wince, looked at her shoulder, and grinned.

"Good match Tenten-chan. Even though you didn't win, I'll still teach you a jutsu." Naruto said to her, as he flicked the small drop of blood off of his father's sword. For the next hour, Naruto taught Tenten one of Anko's personal jutsu; Suiton: Suikei no jutsu (Water Release: Water Whip Technique). This technique shot a thin whip, laced with chakra, from the user's mouth that they could control. The jutsu could be used to restrain opponents, swat them away, or impale them (if the chakra was focused at the tip). The seal sequence was only two seals, but the chakra control was very demanding. Naruto had taken two weeks to learn the Suikei, due to his lack of control. Tenten managed to get it down within an hour. After she performed it perfectly, the two lovebirds heard a clapping noise up in the trees. They looked up and saw a young girl in a deep blue battle kimono. She could not have been a year older than Tenten. Her long black hair was tied up in a ponytail, but a strand or two fell about her beautiful face. Her face was pale, and her lips were full. But her most surprising feature was her eyes; they were the same blue as Naruto's.

"Quite an impressive match you two." She appraised them as she jumped down from the tree she was in. Naruto unconsciously let his hand drift towards Crocodylus' hilt.

"Who are you? A ninja?" Naruto asked in a falsely casual tone. The girl regarded him with the calm look on her face sticking.

"I guess you could say that. I'm more of a good samaritan who knows about being a ninja." She explained to them.

"Well, if you really wanted to help the people of this country, you could join me and my group. Our ambition is to complete a bridge to the mainland and cripple Gato's hold on the country. We're going to need all of the help we can get if we're to do this." Naruto told the girl. Her eyes lit up as she looked at Naruto and Tenten.

"You'd really let me join you?" she breathed, hope and joy in her tone.

"Of course we would. But first, I must apologize." Naruto said as he raised his hands in an almost prayer-like style.

"For what?" she asked, raising a delicate eyebrow.

"For this." Naruto answered as he did a backflip, but flicked his foot out to kick the girl. She managed to dodge the strike and settled into a loose fighting stance.

"What was that for?!" she exclaimed, irritation etched over her face. Naruto calmly drew Caduceus.

"It's a test; we need strong people helping us." Naruto stated before he charged at her. The girl pulled out a small combat knife that looked old, but well cared for. She was able to block Naruto's strikes, or dodge them most of the time. Occasionally, she would fire off a couple of senbon needles. Most of them would miss Naruto, but four or five of them had imbedded themselves into random points on his body. Naruto had completely disregarded these senbon and continued his onslaught, sometimes with his sword, sometimes with his feet and fists. For the entire time, the girl evaded his strikes, even when Naruto used the Moroha no mai. It wasn't long until the jutsus came out.

"Futon: Renkudan!" Naruto announced the name of one of his favourite jutsus, and blew the air bullet. The girl rolled out of the way and landed near the small pond in the clearing. Naruto and Tenten's eyes damn near popped out of their heads when the girl began to form one-handed seals. Naruto rushed her, intent on stopping her from using her jutsu. He was too slow, as the girl finished the sequence and announced her jutsu:

"Hijutsu: Sensatsu Suisho!" (Secret Technique: A Thousand Flying Water Needles of Death) and true to its name, a thousand droplets of water rose from the pond, and became needles... of _ice._ Naruto frowned as he observed and dodged the needles; could this person be who he thought she was?

His musings were cut short as a couple of ice needles pierced a point in his arm, making it spasm and drop Caduceus. The sword went flying and landed at the girl's feet. Naruto's jaw almost dropped off when she picked up the sword, and didn't drop it because it was freezing her hand.

"STOP!" Naruto shouted, making the girl falter for a moment. "What is your full name?" Naruto demanded, looking at the girl seriously.

"Koori Haku, but why do you want to know?" Haku asked, arching her eyebrow.

"Did you have a relative by the name of Koori Suishou?" Naruto asked with something like desperation in his voice.

"Y-yes, she was my aunt. Why does it matter to you?" Haku asked, but her confused expression turned to shock when she saw the Naruto's eyes. "Those eyes... Was she your..."

"Yes, she was my mother." Naruto finished. Haku's expression did not change for a moment, but tears began to well up in her eyes after a moment.

"Th-then th-that makes y-you my c-c-c-cousin!" she cried, closing the distance between them and trapping Naruto in a hug. Naruto returned the embrace; he did have family after all. Breaking the barriers, Naruto let the tears come and tears streamed down his face.

Tenten watched from the side lines, both surprised and touched. The two cousins continued to hold each other and cry in happiness. After a couple of minutes, Naruto and Haku broke apart. Haku sniffled as she smiled happily, wiping the remaining tears from her puffy eyes.

"W-what tipped y-you off that I w-was related to y-you Naruto?" Haku choked out. Naruto wiped a tear from her eye.

"W-well one, you can use Hyoton jutsu like me." Here Naruto demonstrated the Fubuki no jutsu. "Two, you can pick up Caduceus without it freezing your hand; only members of the Koori clan can wield the Tatsujin Tsurugi no Iryounin." Naruto explained. Haku's eyes widened at the latter statement; she had heard rumours of her family possessing the sword that could bring back the dead, but had dismissed them. She didn't like rumours; it was either cold hard facts or nothing for her. "and three, our eyes are the exact same colour." Naruto added as an afterthought. Tenten voiced a question that had been nagging her for a little while now.

"What was with the sudden duel there Naruto-kun?" she asked her boyfriend. Naruto smiled sagely.

"You do not truly know someone until you fight them." Was his reply.

* * *

The next couple of days were fairly uneventful. The rest of Team Nine and Naruto's senseis were a little reluctant to trust Haku at first, but they got over it quickly. Tenten was interested in learning from Haku, seeing as she knew a few medical techniques. Gai and Lee continued to train their stamina for their next encounter with Kisame. Neji trained his Byakugan, trying to minimize the tiny blind spot behind his first thoracic vertebrate. Hayate trained with Anko, teaching her the Mikazuki no mai, and she in turn teaching him a couple of jutsus. Naruto was working on his eighth sword dance, the Bara no mai (Dance of the Rose). What Naruto did for this dance was he extended Crocodylus and stabbed his enemy in the stomach. Once he retracted Crocodylus, Naruto would dart forwards and start making shallow cuts across his enemy's body. Once he had cut them enough so that they wouldn't be moving anywhere too fast, he would puncture his opponent's lungs or other vital organs. He would then kick them away and leave them for dead.

'_Heh, that gives me an idea; "Those who see the Rose will see no more."'_ Naruto thought as he walked back to the house from another hard day's work.

* * *

Naruto awoke to a scream the next morning. He bolted up and quickly pulled on a pair of pants and a thin vest. Strapping his swords onto him, he hurried downstairs to meet the scene: The screamer was Tsunami, who was threatening to commit suicide to a pair of samurai-like thugs if they didn't let Inari go. The two of them smirked and prepared to chop Inari to bits. Their blades were stopped by Naruto who had drawn both Crocodylus and Caduceus. Their split second of surprise was all that he needed. He parried the strike of the one on the right, and slashed him across the stomach. As the thug's blood sprayed everywhere, Naruto thrust Crocodylus through his back. He switched Caduceus to his right hand and quickly blocked a heavy slash from the second. Naruto pushed back his opponent and announced his attack.

"Tsubaki no mai!" Naruto began rapidly stabbing his opponent in all of his vital points in a time under three seconds. Naruto kicked the holey corpse away and picked up his swords before he realized what he had done.

Naruto exited the house and promptly threw up in the water. He got back up and quickly wiped his mouth. He quickly drank some water to get rid of the taste in his mouth and thought about what he had just done; he had killed for the first time. He shook the thought aside and looked back at the shocked Inari and Tsunami.

"You two okay?" he asked as he threw the bodies into the water. Inari recovered first.

"Y-yeah, thank you... Naruto-niisan." Inari whispered as he ran up to hug Naruto.

"Ne, Tsunami-san, where'd my set go?" Naruto asked her. She told him that they all went to guard the bridge and Naruto quickly took off after dressing fully.

'_He's really something else.'_ Tsunami thought as she watched the blonde fly away.

* * *

Naruto arrived at the bridge to find a thin fog setting in, and his group standing together while back to back and surrounding Tazuna.

Anko scowled. "You couldn't have taken any longer, eh?" she asked sarcastically, Murasaki drawn and held at ready.

"Maa, there was a kidnapping attempt back at the fort. What's going on?" Naruto retorted.

"Your death is what's going on." Came a hoarse voice from the mist as two figures dropped out of nowhere. One of them was, by a visual estimate, about 6'3". He wore a helmet style hitai-ate with the Kirigakure symbol on it. He wore a black cloak with little blue sharks on it, but Naruto could tell simply by the hand on his huge zanbatou that he was quite buff. His skin was blue, and his face looked rather like a shark's, complete with 'gills' on his cheeks, much like Naruto's whiskers. He grinned, showing off huge, pointy teeth. Naruto's first impression of Hoshigaki Kisame: Freaky.

The second figure looked to be about 5'5", and about as old as Haku. He was wearing a thin blue sleeveless vest with black pants and ninja zori. He was quite pale, and had blue-green eyes. His hair was a grayish-white, and there were two red dots on his forehead, and reddish bags under his eyes. He was staring at the group of ninja with a bored expression. Naruto's first impression? Creepy.

"Well, well, looks like some more bugs joined the party. More for us, eh Kimimaro?" Kisame asked the boy called Kimimaro, who nodded with a tiny smile.

"Hai, Kisame-san." He replied in a deep voice as he loosened his vest. The group's eyes almost popped out of their heads when a large bone started to protrude from his shoulder. Naruto was pretty sure that his eyes _did_ pop out when Kimimaro pulled the bone from his shoulder and it looked like a sword.

'_A Kaguya? I thought that they were all wiped out in the Kirigakure Kekkei Genkai Genocide. Oh well, guess they missed one.'_ Naruto thought as he brainstormed a simple plan.

"Okay, this is what we'll do; Gai-sensei, Anko-sensei, Hayate-sensei, you take Kisame. I'm sure that he'll have a hard time taking the three of you. I'll take on the Kaguya guy. Neji-teme, Lee, Tenten-chan, Haku, you four stay here and guard Tazuna." Naruto explained. The Jounins nodded and got ready. The Genin protested. Haku nodded and took out a few senbon needles.

"Naruto-kun, you can't just take him on alone! He could be so much stronger than you, and you could get hurt!" Lee protested, taking off his sunglasses. Tenten was looking at him fearfully, and Neji looked a little pissed too. Haku's pretty face was just grim.

"Yeah but you see, this works perfectly. If I go alone and he defeats me, he'll be weakened and easier for you three to finish off. Hopefully I'll survive and defeat him. If not... well... at least I'll go out in style." Naruto quieted at the last part as he set Kokushibyou off to the side, drew Caduceus and held it at ready. Tenten summoned a wakizashi, Lee got into a Goken (Strong Fist) stance, and Neji slid into a Juken stance. For a moment, all was still. Kisame broke the standoff by charging with surprising speed, Kimimaro at his side. Gai, Hayate, and Anko charged to intercept Kisame, and Naruto began to strafe-charge Kimimaro. The Kaguya kept his wary eyes on Naruto as he ran all over the place, until finally their blades met.

Kimimaro immediately noted that Naruto was using very little strength in his slashes and stabs, but was relying more on speed to make his fighting style effective. He would also throw in a punch or kick every now and then. Naruto suddenly used an iaijutsu as he drew his other sword, which Kimimaro was forced to block. This left an opening for Naruto to deliver a powerful hook kick to Kimimaro's ribcage. The Kaguya boy flew to the right while rotating from the forge of the extremely strong kick. He landed on his side but was able to flip backwards and onto his feet. He looked at Naruto who was in a loose defensive stance.

"You are quite good Naruto. Using less strength to increase your speed is an impressive tactic." Kimimaro appraised. Naruto allowed a shadow of a grin onto his face.

"Thank you Kimimaro; you're not too shabby when it comes to playing with long, sharp toys either... but of course, you're not going all out, are you?" Naruto asked as he used the quick release mechanism on his weights. Kimimaro raised a white eyebrow; the blonde boy was sharp.

"That's where you are correct." Kimimaro replied before he began to run at Naruto nearing twice as fast as before. Naruto was glad that he had discarded his 100 pound weights from his legs, or he would've been mince meat. Naruto wasn't feeling so confident now; it only got worse when Kimimaro started a dance.

"Yanagi no mai!" Kimimaro stated coolly. He dropped his sword, and a set of bones extended from his palms like a set of katars. He began to perform several complex acrobatics as he tried to impale Naruto. The blonde, luckily, was able to escape with only a couple of light scratched which Kyuubi saw to healing. Kimimaro came in for one last stab with a complicated flip; this ensured that he didn't see Naruto wrap Crocodylus around him in a pattern that had the edges of the blade sticking out. Kimimaro _heard_ what Naruto said, however.

"Karamatsu no mai!" Naruto countered, spinning rapidly. Kimimaro was caught on the edges of the chain blade, and winced as they sliced his skin. He was lucky enough to be able to put up a shield of bones when he was hit. He grunted when Naruto unsheathed the blade and kicked him in the face, sending him flying. Kimimaro winced; those cuts piled up.

"How the blazes were you able to use one of my clan's dances?!" Kimimaro demanded. Naruto's eyebrow shot up, and he yelled over to one of the three that were fighting Kisame.

"HAYATE SENSEI, YOU LYING ASS! YOU DID _NOT_ INVENT THOSE FIVE DANCES!!!" Naruto screamed at Hayate who had just gotten 'shaved' by the now unsheathed Samehada.

"NOW ISN'T THE TIME TO START MEANINGFUL CONVERSATION- HACK- BETWEEN MASTERR AND APPRENTICE NARUTO! I'M A LITTLE BUSY HERE!' Hayate yelled back. Team Gai sweatdropped, as did Naruto. Unfortunately, that was the only opening Kimimaro needed.

"Teshi Sendan!" (Finger Bullet Drill) He shouted as he held his hands out in front of him. From his fingers, ten little bone bullets shot out of them. They flew at Naruto extremely quickly, but Tenten was faster. She jumped in the path of one of the more lethal bullets, and it went straight into her flesh with a sickening sound of flesh being ripped. Naruto stared on in horror as his girlfriend fell to the ground.

"TENTEN-CHAN!" Naruto cried, crouching down by his now bleeding girlfriend.

"Naruto-kun... are you... alright?" Tenten whispered out. Her voice was fading, as was the vibrant light in her eyes. Tears began to fall from Naruto's eyes.

"Why did you jump in front? Why did you have to do that?!" Naruto almost shouted hysterically. Tenten smiled weakly and caressed his face.

"Because... I love you Naruto-kun. I... I... would sacrifice... myself to make sure... that you were alive... and happy." Tenten coughed up small gouts of blood. "I'm sorry... we couldn't spend... more time... together..." her voice was barely audible. "...Koishii." Tenten went limp and her eyes closed. Naruto held his dying girlfriend to his chest and began to weep. The rest of Team Gai and Haku looked distraught. Kimimaro wore a neutral expression.

"Such devotion to love... I admire that in a person. You were a lucky man Naruto. She-" Kimimaro stopped his monologue when an aura of pure malice and rage began to emanate from Naruto. Everyone on the bridge froze; even Kisame stopped fighting, mid-swing.

'_Oh no! Could the seal have broken?!'_ Anko thought wildly. Hayate and the rest of the ninja on the bridge were too paralyzed to move. Naruto turned to Kimimaro, who received the shock of his life; Naruto looked like a demon. His once blue eyes were now red with slit pupils. His whisker marks had deepened, his teeth were larger and sharper, his hair was wilder. And when he spoke, there appeared to be two voices overlapping. One was Naruto's. The other was deep, rumbling, and absolutely dripping with malice.

"**That, you Kaguya fool, is the last mistake you will ever make. Prepare to feel our wrath as we plunge the Sword of Death through your heart! Koi, Kokushibyou!"** Naruto said, holding out his hand. The huge sword that he had left flew to his hand, like a hawk to its master. As Naruto gripped the sheath and hilt, the mist lifted. As Naruto tensed and began to pull the sword out, the temperature rose noticeably, and black clouds began to form in the sky. Thunder crashed and lightning flashed as the evil blade became more visible. Finally, a deafening thunderclap sounded as Naruto drew the blade completely out of its sheath. Kimimaro stared in fascination at the moving picture of the flames on the blade. The red-eyed Naruto glared at Kimimaro and held the blade against his arm.

"**Jagan!" (Evil Eye)** Naruto spat. The slit in the blade opened to reveal an eye. The pupil was a slit, and the white of the eye was a venomous green. Four red spikes tapered towards the slit from diagonals in the eye. Kimimaro had the misfortune to look into the eye. Less than a second later, the last Kaguya was on the ground, writhing and screaming in pain. Naruto looked at Kisame, and pointed Kokushibyou at him.

"**You're dead."** Was all he said before he blurred out of existence. He reappeared in front of Kisame and swung the huge sword like it was a kunai. Kisame barely managed to block the attack, and they didn't stop coming. Naruto continued to drive Kisame towards the edge of the bridge until Kisame backflipped off of the bridge. Naruto lowered Kokushibyou, but he knew that they weren't done yet.

"Suiton: Suikōdan no jutsu!" (Water Release: Water Shark Missile Technique) came a shout from below. A large pillar of water rose up and took the form of a huge shark with teeth as large as Naruto. Naruto ran through a set of seals faster than anyone could keep track of.

"**Futon: Furyuudan no jutsu!"** Naruto cried, launching the huge, shrieking wind dragon at the water shark. The two attacks met, and the Furyuudan tore through the Suikōdan. Naruto followed the wind dragon and bore down on Kisame who was in the middle of a familiar seal sequence.

"Kuchiyose no jutsu!" Kisame roared. There was a large explosion of water, and a huge great white shark that had to be thirty feet long was now sitting at the surface of the water. It tried to take a snap at Naruto, who barely managed to activate his Kaze Suihou and swoop out of the way in time.

"**Oi, Kisame; whaddaya want?"** the huge shark boomed.

"I'm kinda in a bind here, Carcharodon. There's a demon kid who wants to roast my ass. A little help, please?" Kisame replied while staring into the shark's watermelon sized eye. Just as Carcharodon was about to agree, Naruto, riding on a huge blue gharial rose out of the water. Carcharodon managed to evade the huge reptile's snapping jaws, and snapped back. The two huge beasts clashed on the surface, with their masters exchanging blows whenever they could. The gharial eventually managed to clamp down on the shark's top fin, but the shark was biting into the gharial's side. Both of the summons disappeared and the two swordsmen met in the air. Samehada and Kokushibyou clashed, and lightning flew from Kokushibyou. Despite being stronger than the brat, Kisame felt Samehada and himself being pushed back.

"H-how? How can you be stronger than me?!" Kisame cried, forcing chakra into his scaly blade to reinforce it. The red-eyed Naruto grinned, showing off his huge teeth.

"**This is the power of a Jinchuriki and the Sword of Death."** He whispered venomously. Kisame gritted his teeth as he pushed away from the boy. He raised an eyebrow when the kid began to speak.

"**Listen Kisame; ****We did a little research on Gato. For the past times that he's hired nukenin to do his dirty work, he's always killed them so that he doesn't have to pay them. And if you think that just because you look like you'll eat him if he's not gonna pay you, think again. We suppose that you're wondering 'If this gaki is right, what the hell am I gonna do?' are we correct?"** Naruto asked. Kisame was shocked out of his mind; the kid knew exactly what he was thinking. But if he abandoned Gato, what would he do? Sure the life of a nukenin was good without rules and laws to stop you from having fun, but it was hard sometimes. It was hard because you didn't have a steady income of cash, so you couldn't always buy your food. The other hard part was that you had to be stealthy all the time, for fear of being caught or killed. Kisame had had it rough, and he knew it. Being a dangerous nukenin wasn't what he wanted for Kimimaro.

"Well what do you want us to do brat? It's not like Kami-sama's gonna beam down from heaven and help us." Kisame deadpanned. Naruto rolled his eyes.

"**Well****, perhaps we can ask the Hokage to instate you into Konoha's ranks. If you are thinking that we should not try, the Hokage is almost our... well, Naruto's... grandfather and we would probably be able to persuade him to let you and Kimimaro in. Sure you may be shunned or mistrusted for a while due to your background, but we're sure that you'll be accepted eventually. Kimimaro was never a missing-nin in the first place, so he will be accepted with open arms."** Naruto said to the shark-faced man. Kisame was looking rather unsure of himself. Kimimaro (who had recently gotten up, but was still in a lot of pain) was looking at his master, waiting for a decision. Naruto began to get impatient... until he felt some sort of pulse from Caduceus. Naruto looked down at the sword again as it sent out another pulse. Oddly enough, Naruto knew what the sword wanted.

"**You want to be drawn?"** Naruto whispered as he unsheathed the sword. Another pulse directed him to the dying form of his girlfriend, whom he'd forgotten momentarily in his rage. Naruto crouched down in front of Tenten, and another pulse came. But this one changed something about Naruto's sight.

His normal perception became a little bit blurry, and he could now see something terrifying; Shinigami had a grip on Tenten's soul, and was trying to pull it out of her body. The purple-skinned, yellow eyed death god glanced at him momentarily before turning back to his task.

'_What the hell do I do now?!'_ Naruto screamed inwardly. Another pulse was sent to him; cut Shinigami's arm, and his grip will fail. Naruto quickly made a slashing motion with the sword, and severed Shinigami's arm. The god recoiled, and his severed arm disintegrated. Tenten's soul returned to her body, and her wounds began to heal. After a moment, she opened her eyes. Naruto felt himself start to tear up.

"Tenten-chan." Naruto whispered, bringing her into a gentle hug. Tenten regained her motor skills a moment later, and returned the embrace.

"Naruto-kun, what happened to me? A-all I remember is getting hit by that Teshi Sendan, talking to you, and walking towards this big c-creepy gate with a demon face on it." Tenten babbled as she nuzzled into his chest. Naruto was about to explain when a haughty voice interrupted him.

"Aw, ain't that touching boys?" the voice asked. The nin group and Tazuna turned to see Gato with a couple hundred armed cronies.

"Too bad we'll have to kill you all, you too Kisame. See, I never intended to pay you; it's too much of a hassle to give up the cash." Gato said. Kisame was outraged.

I told ya, fish face." Said Naruto as he picked up Kokushibyou which he had put down when he revived Tenten. Gato looked at him and began to laugh.

"YOU'RE gonna try and take us out shrimp?! Don't make me laugh!" Gato arrogantly proclaimed, and a few of his men laughed.

"**NEVER underestimate us, scum."** Naruto growled with so much anger and venom in his voice that a visible bead of sweat formed on Gato's brow. **"We will show you what true power is!"** Naruto began to spin, and swung Kokushibyou with him. After two rotations, Naruto announced his attack:

"**Kokushibyou: Daiindo!" (Black Death: Grand Requiem)** Naruto cried, and an enormous, expanding wave of crackling black and red energy appeared out of nowhere. The blast tore up small chunks of the bridge as it screamed forward and engulfed Gato and his men. The energy wave dissipated after a short distance. Naruto began to pant as Kyuubi stopped transferring his chakra to Naruto. Panting and sweating, Naruto turned back to his team of ninjas, and the newly defected ones. All of them were too shocked to form words.

"Mission complete." Naruto wheezed as he fell to the ground.

* * *

A week later, the ninja group bade goodbye to the people of Wave Country, who had named the completed bridge the 'Great Naruto Bridge' in the blonde's honour. Inari had bawled his eyes out as he watched 'Naruto-niisan' shrink into the sky as he flew away.

Back in Konoha two days later, Sarutobi listened to the mission report. Once finished, he turned to Kisame, Kimimaro, and Haku.

"Naruto, could you please explain to me who the two young ones are, and why there is an S-rank nukenin amongst you?" Sarutobi asked in a calm manner. Naruto took a deep breath and explained.

"Haku here is my cousin." Naruto began, making Sarutobi choke on the smoke from his pipe. "And Kisame and Kaguya Kimimaro wish to defect to Konoha. Kimimaro and Haku were never registered ninja to start with, so they should be able to join our ranks easily. I'm not too sure about Kisame though." Naruto finished. Sarutobi's face was expressionless as he tried to comprehend what Naruto was saying; another member of the Koori clan, and the last member of a clan with an _extremely_ valuable Kekkei Genkai wanted to join Konoha. To make it even better, an S-rank ninja wanted to join as well.

"Well Naruto, Haku and Kimimaro are able to join Konoha's ranks without question. The Mizukage won't be too happy about this though... not that I care what that tyrant thinks." Cue sweatdrop. "They will have to start as Genin though. Perhaps you three should become a team and enter the upcoming Chuunin Exams together. Kisame will have to be put on trial to see if he will be able to join Konoha." Sarutobi explained. Haku and Kimimaro smiled in gratitude, and Kisame nodded in understanding. Haku voiced a question out of the blue.

"Pardon me Hokage-sama, but where will Kimimaro-kun and I live? We have no money, so we cannot afford apartments." Haku pointed out. Sarutobi just grinned.

Naruto, I think it's time to raise your clan house."

* * *

**Finally done! Next time: Team Bloodline! Here come the Chuunin Exams!**

**Dirty Reid **


	6. The Road to Victory

**A Swordsman's Road**

**Chapter 5: The Road to Victory**

**A.N.: Hello everyone. Sorry about the long wait, but I had other stories to attend to. But at long last, here is the moment you've all been waiting for!**

* * *

For the next month, Naruto and the new Konoha recruits got to know each other.

Kisame was ruled to be able to stay in Konoha, but narrowly. The shark man said that he was approved by about one or two votes. But with his judgment came conditions. The ex-Kiri nin was to be placed under 24 hour surveillance for three months. If he exhibited any form of law-related violation, he would be cast out of Konoha. This stipulation made Kisame a little jitterier, as he was already rather paranoid. Naruto consoled the shark man by allowing him to take up residence in his _extremely large_ estate.

At first, Naruto couldn't believe that the large mansion was his own home. The place was at least a dozen times as large as his old apartment! There were five bedrooms, and one master bedroom (Which Naruto claimed as his own, of course), four full bathrooms, a large kitchen and dining room, a luxurious lounge, a game room, and a Zen Garden in the backyard with a large training ground. Naruto was in heaven as he, Haku, Kimimaro, and Kisame explored the house.

As the four got used to the house, Naruto got to know his new roomies. Kisame was the epitome of a bachelor. He lazed around until around ten to noon each day, and dragged his ass out of bed with tousled hair, bloodshot eyes, and a set of wool pants and a blue bathrobe with little sharks on it. He would also cook up some food and eat it right out of the pot, leaving nothing for anyone else. Naruto was distraught to squander a small piece of his inheritance when he learned that Kisame ate almost as much fish as he did ramen. On more than one occasion, the fox and the shark had a contest to see who could eat more of their culinary pleasure. Naruto won two times out of their three competitions. But both of them vomited after each of them.

Haku was like the house wife he never had. She was an extremely tidy woman, and didn't seem to mind cleaning up after others. But she showed her unexpectedly fiery temper when the boys left too much of a mess. Kimimaro, Kisame, and Naruto all agreed that an angry Haku was probably the scariest encounter in each of their lives.

But her temper rarely surfaced. Aside from keeping the house clean, Haku would also add a little feminine touch to the Namikaze mansion that just seemed... _right_. When Naruto asked his cousin how she did it, she would simply shrug in response, not saying anything.

Kimimaro was a rather... interesting person when he opened up. When he was being tutored under Kisame, he had shut away his normal side, which was a laid-back, calm, easy-going guy. But what Naruto found truly hilarious, was that Kimimaro was a freakin' _pervert._ On multiple occasions, Naruto or Kisame would hear shrieks or screams and the sounds of fists hitting flesh from the bathrooms, signifying that Haku had caught Kimimaro peeping at her. Other times, Haku would put Kimimaro-shaped dents in the wall when he 'accidentally' let his hand brush over her pleasantly round rump, or he was waving his hand carelessly and let it brush against her ample breasts. Neither Naruto nor Kisame would intervene, preferring to watch Kimimaro's perversions and subsequent beatings amusedly, and to avoid Haku turning her wrath upon them. Other than that, Kimimaro was generally a fun-lover.

To improve themselves working as a team, Naruto, Kimimaro, Haku, Anko, Kisame, and Hayate all trained together whenever they could. From Monday to Wednesday, they trained in kenjutsu. Haku solved her problem of being bereft of a sword by purchasing a western style hand-and-a-half broadsword which she called Seihyo, due to the blue tinged blade. The blade was about sixty centimetres long, and the hilt about twenty-five. The sword was neither particularly light nor heavy, but the weight would allow Haku to deliver a more damaging slash, or block quickly. Naruto would also let her use Caduceus every now and then, but was still rather unwilling to give up his blades. Luckily, Haku understood that he considered his swords as a part of him.

Haku learned quickly, as Naruto found when she mastered the Tsubaki, Yuukaku, and Moroha no mai in three days. Kimimaro was almost jittery to learn Naruto's personal sword dances. Hayate was almost as eager as the bone user. Kisame was all too delighted to teach Naruto how to wield a sword of the likes of a zanbato. But Naruto had to be careful when wielding Kokushibyou; any sudden emotion or transferring chakra to his limbs would make the demon blade let off some sort of elemental attack. Naruto's inadvertent attacks with the evil sword resulted in multiple of their training grounds being destroyed.

After almost losing a limb, Kisame provided Naruto with a solution. He returned to Kiri, and brought back his first blade, Hoshizora. Hoshizora was a five foot long zanbato that resembled an ANBU katana, though it had no special abilities like Samehada. Its handle was wrapped in a slightly frayed white material that was still comfortable to the touch. A small half-notch started the cutting edge, and gave way to the wide blade. Unlike a normal ANBU katana, the blade curved into the tip. The reason that Hoshizora had its name was because the entire blade was painted a non-reflective black, and decorated by images of twinkling stationary and shooting stars, and the gas giants. Naruto was all too happy to be using Hoshizora, but was now weighed down by four swords. Once again, Kisame provided Naruto with a solution. He gave Naruto the blueprints for a seal that could contain objects on his person in the form of a tattoo. Kisame himself used this seal to store Samehada sometimes. When Naruto sealed all of his swords, it made him look that much more badass. On his upper left arm was a tattoo of a dark green crocodile, coiling around his arm with its jaws open, looking ready to bite something. This image signified Crocodylus. On his lower left arm was a large green eye with four red, diagonal streaks pointing towards the centre of the slit pupil. This one represented Kokushibyou, of course.

On his upper right arm was an image of a pair of coiling snakes and a set of feathered wings, representing Caduceus' seal. On his lower right arm was a thick, black band with images of stars and planets in it. Obviously, this was Hoshizora's seal. All Naruto had to do was swipe some blood across the tattoo in order to summon the sword.

Thursday and Friday was taijutsu training. Even Kisame admitted that he would be reduced to a lower A to higher B-rank nin, should he not be using Samehada. Anko taught the Kiri defectors and Haku the basics of the Hachuuken, and Naruto started teaching everyone what he could perform of the Namikaze taijutsu style, Kempo. Kisame and Kimimaro were more of brute force fighters, making them more suited to using Kempo. Haku performed everything she did with grace, making her lean towards the Hachuuken. In their matches, all four of them were pretty much evenly matched. Naruto and Haku were a little better at evading, and Kisame and Kimimaro had more strength on their sides.

The weekends were ninjutsu training. Kisame had a high water affinity, and could therefore teach Naruto, Haku, Anko and Hayate quite a few high grade Suiton jutsu. From one of them, Naruto created another original jutsu, the Hyoro no jutsu. Much like its predecessor, the Suiro no jutsu, the Hyoro created a large sphere of ice. Naruto had so far made the prison almost eight centimetres thick. How Naruto improved it was that he put a large amount of compressed chakra into the ice, and that eliminated the problem of needing to stay in contact with the prison. In turn, the Konoha crew taught Kisame and Kimimaro a few non-Kiri native jutsu such as the Kage Bunshin, Tsuchi Bunshin, Katon: Gōkakyū no jutsu, Katon: Karyū Endan, and Futon: Daitoppa.

Haku taught Naruto how to truly use his bloodline; to manipulate water at will. Apparently, his mother's scroll had been incomplete for some reason. Naruto took great joy in this, as he would often redirect the tap water from the sink into the face, or onto the clothing of whoever had turned it on. Haku also taught Naruto the two Hyoton jutsu that she had created; Sensatsu Suishō, and Makyō Hyōshō. In turn, Naruto let Haku learn all of the Hyoton and hybrid Hyoton jutsu that he had created.

When Kimimaro was tested for his elemental affinity, he, unsurprisingly, had water. His second affinity was wind. The Kaguya soaked up the jutsu that Naruto and Haku taught him like a sponge. But he did something that surprised all of them.

One day when all six of them were gathering in Naruto's estate training ground, they found Kimimaro standing there, with his hands glowing different colours. His right hand was glowing blue, while his left hand was glowing a semi-opaque white. He brought his hands together, and the two chakras became a very pale blue. Five jaws dropped when Kimimaro performed the Hyoton: Hyodan no jutsu. When they all demanded to know how he performed a Kekkei Genkai oriented jutsu, he replied that he simply charged his hands with his water and wind chakras, and brought them together to create ice chakra. Anko got an odd gleam in her eyes afterwards, but refused to say why.

And with moving into his father's house, Naruto and company gained access to one of the largest jutsu libraries they had ever seen. Ninjutsu, genjutsu, taijutsu, fuuinjutsu, kenjutsu, and kinjutsu sat upon the shelves. Naruto almost ran out of drool as he immersed himself in everything from Chuunin to Kage level jutsu.

* * *

After three weeks of training together, 'Team Bloodline' as they styled themselves, were strolling casually through the residential district after a little lunch. Kimimaro had complained about it being ramen again, and said he was sick of the crappy noodles. Naruto stared at the Kaguya, horrified. Teuchi and Ayame were actually leaking killing intent as well.

"BLASPHEMY!" Naruto had cried, pointing at Kimimaro and pulling out a vial of some clear liquid. He threw it in Kimimaro's pale face, and the older boy fell to the ground, clutching his face and screaming in agony as steam rose from his burning visage.

**Far, far away…**

A scientist opened a small package that was supposed to contain a one percent solution of hydrogen peroxide. He pulled out a small vial and put his glasses on to read the label…

It was black with a white cross on it, and white writing that read…

"Holy water?" he read aloud, his tone containing confusion. "Where's that acid I ordered?"

**Back to Konoha…**

As the three walked down the street, they noticed something; it was way too quiet. All of them had different reactions. Naruto's hair stood straight up. Haku stopped in mid stride. Kimimaro narrowed his eyes and looked from right to left slowly.

"I've got a bad feeling about this." Haku whispered, sliding Seihyo out of its sheath a margin. Pointed bone claws began to protrude from Kimimaro's fingertips. Naruto summoned Hoshizora from the tattoo on his arm, making the tattoo disappear. Their steps were like the thundering footfalls of an elephant as the three crept down the street. When they heard a voice shout out, they almost jumped out of their skins.

"That hurt gaki!" it said. Naruto, Kimimaro and Haku slunk silently to the path where the voice had come from. Looking into the alley, they saw two Suna nin, a black clad male and a blonde female with a fan, harassing a small boy with two little kids begging him to put their 'leader' down.

"Kankuro, stop it. We're gonna get in deep shit if you're caught." Said the girl, glowering at Kankuro.

"I don't care. I'm just gonna teach this kid a lesson in pain for not respecting the nin of Suna!" Kankuro spat, rearing his fist back.

_Whish! _Before Kankuro could bring his fist forwards, something long and white and spiky wrapped around him. As he registered it was there and looked at it, Kankuro winced in disgust and turned a little green as he discovered that it appeared to be a stretched spinal column. He looked up the chain to see a tall boy with some sort of drill forming on his left arm. Beside him was a smaller boy with a zanbato.

"**Tessenka no mai!**** Hana!"** they said in unison. The tall boy thrust his drill forwards, and the smaller boy held his zanbato by his head. Before either Suna nin could react, there were two blades and a giant drill made of bones pointing at their vital points. For Kankuro, the drill was pointed at his heart, and the zanbato was at his carotid artery. For the girl, the tip of Haku's blade was touching her throat.

"Put the kid down, assholes. Otherwise, butchers across Konoha are gonna be having a _lot_ of complaints that their beef doesn't taste right." Naruto warned them. Still reeling from the speed that these people moved at, the Suna boy dropped the child.

"Good boy." Kimimaro taunted with a nasty grin on his face as he released Kankuro and lowered the drill. Kankuro growled and reached for the large bundle on his back.

"You're not going to use 'that' are you?" his female companion gasped. "You know he'll get mad at you." She reprimanded. Kankuro huffed and started to pull at the wrappings.

"Sen'eijashu!" Kimimaro stated. From his dark red sleeve, five snakes shot out and wrapped around Kankuro. The colour in the Suna boy's face drained faster than Naruto's ramen broth.

"AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHH! SNAKES! GET EM' OFF, GET EM' OFF, GET EM' OFF, GET EM' OFF, **GET EM' OFF!!**" Kankuro shrieked in a rather high voice. Kimimaro and Naruto outright laughed, and Haku covered her mouth to muffle her giggles as Kankuro tried to pry the snakes off. Even the girl was laughing. When she stopped, she noticed that the white-haired boy had vanished. She sucked in a shallow breath when she felt a small breath of warm air in her ear.

"So what's your name, gorgeous?" came a deep, sultry voice in her ear. The girl blushed profusely when a pair of strong, pale arms in a red yukata draped over her upper body.

"T-Temari." Temari answered Kimimaro. Naruto watched with a raised eyebrow as the Kaguya worked his magic. His eyebrows disappeared into his blonde hair when he looked over at his cousin. Her face was etched into a scowl, and her grip on Seihyo was making the blade rattle. Naruto wasn't sure, but he thought he could hear Haku grinding her teeth together.

'_I do believe that this qualifies as Grade-S blackmail material! Sweetness to the max!'_ Naruto thought. His thoughts were interrupted when he heard a loud screech. He looked over to see Kimimaro squeezing Temari's ass, a happily perverted grin on his face. He winced in sympathetic pain when Temari kicked Kimimaro in the nuts, making him double over. She whacked him on the head with her fan, but he didn't fall down. Instead, there was a noise that sounded rather like an immense gong being rung, and Temari started to quiver. Naruto then noticed that her fan was notched where she had hit Kimimaro. Kimimaro rubbed the back of his head where a small bump was rearing itself.

"That hurt." He deadpanned. Naruto shook his head and snickered.

"Time to pay, blondie!" Kankuro shouted, having freed himself from the snakes. As he reached up to the bundle on his back, a deathly cold, emotionless voice spoke up.

"Kankuro, stop it." The voice was even enough to make Kimimaro shiver. Five sets of eyes turned to the tree from which the voice originated. The speaker was a boy in a fishnet shirt and black kabuki pants with a bright crimson trench coat on. On his hands were black, fingerless gloves with metal plates. And on his back was a huge gourd. He had blood red hair, green eyes with black rings around them like a raccoon, and the red kanji for 'Love' tattooed on his forehead. His cold gaze was directed at Kankuro, who seemed to be more afraid of this boy than snakes. For some reason, Naruto felt something maddeningly familiar about this boy. But he couldn't figure out what it was.

"**Hmm... interesting..."** Kyuubi muttered from his cage.

'_What's interesting, Fuzzy?' _Naruto asked.

"**Well kit, it just so happens that short, dark, and scary up there is**** another vessel for one of the Nine Demon Lords; a Jinchuriki like you."** Kyuubi explained. Naruto let his mouth fall open a margin.

'_Who's his fuzzy bundle of pain in the ass?'_ Naruto asked. Kyuubi growled in annoyance as Naruto snickered at his bad joke.

"**My former student, actually. The Ichibi no Tanuki, Shukaku." **Kyuubi informed Naruto.

'_What's he like?' _Naruto asked.

"**To put it short; a deranged, perverted, funk machine."** Kyuubi deadpanned. Naruto sweatdropped.

"You're a disgrace to our good name Kankuro." The redhead whispered while amping up the KI he was emitting.

"S-sorry G-Gaara, I-I just-"

"Shut up before I make it rain your blood." Gaara snapped. Kankuro shut up immediately. Judging by the look in Gaara's eyes, Naruto was pretty sure that he would carry out his vow, if need be. He was brought out of his thought when Gaara disappeared in a swirl of sand, and reappeared in front of Naruto's team.

"I apologize for the trouble my team has caused you." Gaara said, not really sounding sincere. Naruto suppose that Gaara had succumbed to the hate of his village, and became a soulless, vengeful, murderous monster of a person.

"No trouble at all." Haku replied, sheathing Seihyo and staring coolly at Kankuro and Temari. Gaara looked at her briefly before returning his gaze to Naruto.

"You interest me." He said to Naruto, who calmly re-sealed Hoshizora, making the tattoo reappear. "Tell me your name." Gaara continued. Naruto stared at Gaara for a moment, completely silent. Gaara's KI output started to increase when Naruto didn't answer. Naruto suddenly slumped over. Haku and Kimimaro started to look rather worried when Gaara's brow furrowed. As the redhead started to raise his hand, a deep, dark voice came from Naruto.

"**Now, now, Shukaku-chan; I thought I taught you better ****manners than that." **The dark tone taunted. Gaara's eyes widened slightly as he came face to face with a red-eyed Naruto, who was smiling the most bowel-loosening, bloodthirsty, scary, and slightly happy smile he had ever seen. Kankuro and Temari looked about ready to shit their drawers. Kimimaro and Haku had been informed of Naruto's condition by Naruto himself, so they simply watched in fascination. Imagine their surprise when Gaara hunched over, exactly the same as Naruto had. When Gaara raised his head, several dark blue lines originated from around his eyes. Gaara's pupils had now become yellow diamonds with four little dots around them.

"**Well, well, well... we meet again ****Kyuubi-sensei. How long has it been; a hundred and twenty years? I wonder how much closer I'll be to whipping your ass now?"** said a hoarse, raspy hiss from Gaara that was still deep and menacing. Kankuro and Temari were starting to back away. Naruto/Kyuubi scoffed.

"**The day you kick my ass is the day that Shinigami no ****danna goes on a no-soul diet, Shukaku."** Kyuubi snorted. **"I just hope that you haven't been tormenting your vessel too much. Tormenting lesser demons is one thing. Tormenting humans is just low." **

"**So what if I have? What are you gonna do about it, **_**sensei**_**?" **Shukaku spat. Naruto/Kyuubi's face remained emotionless for a moment before an evil grin, accompanied by a chuckle, emitted from the blonde.

"**Well… we could place a seal on your vessel that would sever any connection that you have to your vessel. In essence, we would send you into oblivion. Do you know this word, oblivion, Shukaku? It means to be totally forgotten by everyone around you, **_**forever.**_** You would be forever ridiculed as 'The Demon Lord who entered the void'" **Kyuubi said thoughtfully. Gaara/Shukaku's eyes had shrunk to the size of pin heads. They returned to the redhead's normal, jade eyes and he walked away, motioning for Kankuro and Temarito follow him. Naruto's eyes returned to their bright blue as he watched his 'apprentice' go.

"What the hell was that all about?" Kimimaro asked, still nursing the small bump on his head.

"The redheaded dude's a Jinchuriki. If they're entering the exams with us, we should watch out for them." Naruto informed his teammates as they walked back to Naruto's estate.

* * *

The day after the encounter with Gaara and his team, Naruto Haku and Kimimaro all entered the Academy with the full intent of raping the Chuunin Exams up the ass. As the three Kekkei Genkai bearers ascended a flight of stairs, they were greeted by the sight of a large queue of Genin trying to force entry to a room labeled 301, which was being blocked by two large, burly Genin. Amongst the crowd, Naruto spotted Tenten and her team. Holding up his hand and using his chakra to condense some of the water in the air, Naruto formed a trio of ice balls. He chucked them at Lee, Neji, and Tenten, hitting them in the middle of their backs. Team Nine turned to see the rather badass looking Team Bloodline.

Kimimaro was dressed in a set of black leather pants that were tight enough to show off his impressive muscles, but loose enough to allow him flexibility. On his upper body was a navy blue trench coat with a white stripe down each side. He wore no shirt underneath it, showing off his six pack. On his face was a pair of Trooper Bob sunglasses **(A.N.: For you people who don't know what the hell I'm talking about, Trooper Bob sunglasses are those shades that everybody wore in the 80s).**

Haku had placed some makeup on her already pretty face. Around her eyes was a dark layer of mascara, and on her lips was a coating of bright red lipstick. The makeup made her look rather sinister. She was also wearing a dark purple tank top that was unzipped a generous amount, letting some cleavage show. With the tank top was a set of training tights and a short black skirt. On her feet was a pair of knee length leather boots. Seihyo was sitting on Haku's left hip, held up by the purple sash that she wore around her waist.

Naruto was wearing a set of dark red cargo pants, a fishnet shirt, an equally red tank top, and a thick black vest with spikes on the shoulders. His muscular arms were left bare, allowing the tattoos to be viewed by everyone. On his feet were two heavy boots that rumbled like thunder when he walked. Currently, the blonde was looking at his girlfriend, but would let his strangely owlish gaze flit over the crowd, now and then. His observing was stopped when he felt a distinctly feminine object glomp him, knocking the wind out of him.

"Naruto-kun!" Tenten squealed, rubbing her face into his chest. Naruto chuckled a little bit as he hugged her back.

"Good to see you too Ten-chan." He whispered back, bringing his lips to his lover's.

"How are you doing, Naruto?" Lee asked. Naruto noted that he had changed his outfit a little bit. He now wore a black set of shorts and black leg warmers. He had a dark green shirt on with a white Konoha symbol on it, and a black jacket over top of it. On his face were his new 'Trademarked Cool Guy' sunglasses. In the last month, lee and Gai had abandoned their 'Nice Guy' pose for the new 'Cool Guy' pose. This pose was Lee and Gai putting their weight on one leg, and raising their other leg so that only their toes were touching the ground. They would then point forwards with their thumbs sticking upwards as well. Tenten was relieved when they started to do this instead of the Nice Guy pose. Even Neji looked a little better for wear.

"Hey Neji, Lee; what the hell's going on here?" Haku asked. Naruto allowed a tiny upturn of his lips when he saw Neji's gaze linger on his cousin for a moment. Neji twitched before he beckoned Naruto's team to lean in.

"Well, there's a gen-"

"Hey, do us a favour and drop the genjutsu. We're going to the _third_ floor." interrupted an arrogant voice that Naruto knew all too well. The six nin looked to see Sasuke with his chest puffed out a little bit, and the other Genin looking at him in confusion. Naruto rolled his eyes and groaned.

"If this is what a genius is, then I'm glad that I'm considered an idiot." Naruto called loudly to Sasuke, who whipped around and stared at Naruto in anger and confusion.

"That genjutsu was to weed out the weaker teams, douche bag. If you would've just kept your fucking mouth shut and left it, all of the weak competition would've been weeded out! Now we gotta deal with _everyone_, thanks to you, you goddamned twat!" Naruto spat before he ascended the stairs with his teammates and friends. Suddenly feeling particularly spiteful, Naruto performed a Doton: Doryuuheki in the hallway. He smirked as the other students started to yell in protest as the wall solidified.

"Now Naruto-kun; that wasn't very nice." Tenten scolded her boyfriend in an almost motherly way. Naruto looked down at her and stuck out his lower lip, making a sad pout.

"But Ten-chaaaan. They deserved it." Naruto whined in a cute voice that a child would probably use. Tenten giggled at her silly boyfriend before they trudged up the stairs, oblivious to the muffled cries of the Genin behind the wall. As the six ascended the stairs, they were greeted by Anko, Hayate, and Gai, who was dressed exactly like Lee, except he had his Jounin vest on instead of a normal vest.

"What'd you do this time Naruto?" Anko asked with a great deal of amusement in her tone. Naruto returned his sensei's smirk.

"Let's just say that the wussies will be moles for a while." Naruto replied to his sensei. Hayate snickered and Gai shook his head.

"Well, congratulations you six; you can now officially compete in the Chuunin Exams." He said, striking a 'Cool Guy' pose. He elaborated when they looked confused.

"Only a team of three can take the exam. If only two or one of you from each team had showed up, we would've barred you from taking this exam." He explained.

"Now listen up you six. Any sensei would tell you not to stand out. But we say..." Hayate paused and then said in unison with Gai and Anko:

"GO KICK SOME ASS!" they shouted, pumping their fists into the air. Six Genin laughed at their silly teachers before they entered the room. They raised their eyebrows at the sight of hundreds of Genin, sitting or standing around the room. All of their eyes redirected themselves at the six who had entered the room.

"What the fuck are you lookin' at?" Kimimaro asked the general populace. Several of them went back to their business, but others continued to stare. Collectively, Kimimaro Haku and Naruto let loose a wave of KI. Many of the foreign and familiar shinobis' eyes widened and they turned away from Team Bloodline and Team Nine. For a few moments, the six simply stood there, arguing quietly. The debate was over whether one would die from blood loss or suffocation, should they swallow a kunai. Their argument stopped when the so-called 'Rookie Nine' came through the doors, looking rather disheveled and dirty. All of them looked rather angry. Naruto snickered quietly with Kimimaro and his cousin.

"Oi Naruto! What was the deal with the wall?!" Inuzuka Kiba demanded angrily. Naruto looked over at the dirty Inuzuka, noting that his hands were rather scratched up and bleeding in a few places.

"Meh, I figured you deserved another challenge since Sasuke-teme just murdered the initial challenge." Said Naruto with a shrug.

"Pfft, that challenge wasn't hard baka! It'll take a lot more than that to stop us! Right Sasuke-kun?" Ino piped up, looking hopefully at the aloof Uchiha.

"Sheesh, you rookies know how to cause a racket." Said an older-sounding, unfamiliar voice. Fifteen heads swiveled to stare at a greyish-haired, bespectacled Genin in purple garb. His beetle black eyes roamed over the group of Genin, and lingered on Sasuke for a fraction longer.

"A-ano, who are y-you?" stuttered the Hyuuga Heiress, Hinata.

"Yakushi Kabuto." Kabuto introduced himself with a mock bow. "Genin of Konoha, and Information Grub Extraordinaire."

"... Was that just a spur of the moment thing, or did you rehearse that?" Haku asked, getting a chortle from Naruto.

"Yeah, I kinda did rehearse. Was it good or a little too rushed?" Kabuto asked. Naruto and Kimimaro facefaulted.

"Eehh, a little rushed." Haku said with a scrunched up thinking face.

"Ok, I'll remember that for if I have to use it again. Do you rookies want any info on the competition?" Kabuto asked, pulling out a very thick deck of cards. "These cards contain information on the nin participating in this exam. Currently there are twenty-four teams from Konoha, seven from Suna, six from Ame, nine from Taki, two from Kusa, and one from Oto in this exam. I don't know anything about the Oto team, seeing as it is a relatively new country." Kabuto explained. Said Oto team was listening.

"Do you have the low-down on individuals as well?" Sakura asked.

"Why yes, I do. Did any of you have anyone in mind?" Kabuto asked.

"Uzumaki Naruto." Sasuke requested.

"Namikaze." Naruto corrected.

"What?" asked Sakura, looking confused.

"My name is Namikaze Naruto; don't any of you forget it." Naruto proclaimed. Kabuto's eyebrow shot up when Naruto said his true last name.

"That's the Yondaime's last name." he said flatly. Everyone's eyes had drifted to Naruto.

"Yep. My old man, Namikaze Minato, Yondaime Hokage of Konoha." Naruto proudly proclaimed. Now there were protests of disbelief and outrage at Naruto's statement.

"Very well then." Kabuto said, shuffling through his deck. Finally, he set down a card. When Kabuto pumped some chakra into it, a picture of Naruto, and several stats appeared.

"Namikaze Naruto, formerly Uzumaki Naruto, of Konoha. Graduated from the Academy late under special circumstances. Sensei is Mitarashi Anko. New teammates are his cousin, Koori Haku, and Kaguya Kimimaro. Naruto is highly proficient in sword combat, but his ninja techniques are unknown, except for the B-ranked kinjutsu, Kage Bunshin no jutsu. Solo mission history is eight C-rank missions and one A-rank mission. Mission history with Kimimaro and Haku is one C-rank. And that's all I've got." Kabuto reeled off all of the info he had on Naruto and his team. The Rookie Nine and Team Nine turned their astounded, doubtful, and jealous gazes to Naruto's badass team. All three of them were suppressing grins, trying not to look too pleased with their accomplishments.

"Hn, so you've got a team with a couple of losers. Big deal dead last." Sasuke sneered.

_Poof! Shwing! Khlch! _Before anyone could blink, Sasuke had Naruto standing behind him with Caduceus to his throat. Haku crouched to his left, not facing him, and holding Seihyo in a reverse grip with the tip of the blade pointing at Sasuke's crotch luggage. Kimimaro was in a stance that looked rather similar to a Juken stance. From his palm, a bone spike was extended and pointing at Sasuke's heart. Sasuke's eyes widened when he realized his situation.

"You were saying, _dead last_?" Naruto taunted cheekily. Sasuke's glare intensified tenfold as Team Bloodline took their weapons away from him.

"PIPE DOWN, PUNKS!" a very deep voice boomed. Team Bloodline, Team Nine, and the Rookie Nine turned to see a heavily scarred, bear-like man in a black trench coat appear with a dozen or so Chuunin flanking him.

"You three! No fighting until the second exam!" he barked, pointing at Team Bloodline. They withdrew their weapons, and Kimimaro made his spike recede back into his palm.

"Right, sorry." Naruto said sheepishly, resealing Caduceus.

"Anyways, the first exam is about to begin. My name is Morino Ibiki, and I will be supervising you. Follow me." He beckoned the examinees to follow him. Team Bloodline stood on their tiptoes to look into the room that Ibiki had gone into. On the front desk, they saw a large stack of papers and pencils; a written test. All three of them shared a look at each other. Three nods. Three Kage Bunshin no jutsus. Three genjutsus to cover the Kage Bunshins. Team Bloodline trotted to catch up with the group. As they chose seats, Ibiki started to explain the rules of the exam. After five minutes and two complaints, the test began. For a couple of minutes, Team Bloodline sat silently, waiting for their K.B.s to give them the information. Kimimaro raised his head first, and started to write. Haku had been doing the 'Thinking Pose' for a few minutes, and started to write about a minute after Kimimaro finished. Naruto had been drawing random words and equations on his paper before his K.B. dismissed itself, making it look like he was actually thinking. He wrote his answers down and leaned back in his chair when he was done.

After another twenty minutes, Ibiki called a halt to writing. He explained the rules of the tenth question, and allowed anyone who did not want to take it to bow out now. Team Bloodline watched with mild satisfaction as almost three quarters of the teams left. When the losers had finished filing out, there were only about fourteen teams left.

"Does anyone else wish to withdraw?" Ibiki addressed the remaining examinees. Dead silence.

"Very well then." He took a small breath and a pause. "Everyone in this room… passes."

Naruto tuned out the several outraged exclamations and listened faintly as Ibiki explained the true purpose of the test; information gathering. Naruto raised an eyebrow when a whirlpool of water started to form out of nowhere. He grinned a little bit when it exploded outwards, drenching a few people. Where the centre of the water cyclone was, stood Kisame. He now wore a black tank top, loose black pants, and fishnet shirt with a brand new Konoha Jounin vest covering it. As always, Samehada rested on his back. His grin widened until his face was stretched, showing off multiple rows of pointed, shark-like teeth. All but six Genin looked on the ex-Kiri nin in fear or contempt.

"Hello…" Kisame rumbled, making one or two of the remaining examinees recoil at the almost hungry sound of the shark man's voice.

"Hmm… quite a few little fries left Morino-san. I thought that our cohorts said that you could crack even the hardest of criminals." Kisame said to Ibiki, still facing the Genin.

"This is about a seventh of the ones who entered Kisame-san." Ibiki replied. Kisame shrugged his shoulders.

"… Well that sounds about right. But there will be less than half of you by the next exam." Kisame declared with another monstrous grin.

* * *

Naruto watched with a completely calm and confident look on his face as he looked upon the Forest of Death. Identical expressions adorned Haku's and Kimimaro's faces. Naruto smirked at Sasuke as he went in to get his scroll. Sasuke glared back.

"You'll be the first one I take out dobe." Sasuke declared. Naruto stopped his casual walk, and slowly turned to face Sasuke.

"Tell me teme… do you hate me just because my dick is bigger than yours?" Naruto asked casually. Sasuke's eyes widened at the completely unexpected, extremely lewd comment, and he started to sputter. Sakura was shocked silent by Naruto's comment, as she was simply staring at Naruto with her jaw dropped. Mato was doing his best to contain his laughter, due to the irregular looking line that was his mouth. Naruto simply snickered and walked back to his team after receiving a Heaven Scroll.

"Which one do we have?" Kimimaro asked quickly. Naruto slid his scroll out of his vest, allowing Haku and Kimimaro a quick peek before he stuffed it down his pants.

"Ewwww! That's disgusting Naruto!" Haku exclaimed, looking rather grossed out. Kimimaro was also wincing.

"Hey, this just means that our opponents will want it even less!" Naruto retorted hotly. Once again, Haku found she was unable to dispute her rather eccentric cousin's logic. They talked about what strategy they would use, and who to use it on. They quickly came to an agreement; they would make their way to the tower casually for a while. When the competition started to heat up, they would get serious when all of the other teams were tired, hungry, and battle-weakened. Taking a scroll would be easier for them at that point. Kisame's deep voice blared over the megaphones at each gate about ten minutes later.

"Attention all examinees! The second stage of the Chuunin Exams have BEGUN!" the gates creaked open and dozens of ninja teams darted into the dark and foreboding forest. Team Bloodline simply strolled into the forest as though they were taking a walk through the park. They walked casually for about ten minutes, occasionally hearing the screams from other teams.

"I think that it's time we headed in a little bit faster." Naruto said all of a sudden.

"And I thought you said that it would be best for us to wait them out." Haku said matter-of-factly, accompanied by a small smile.

"Well, I did. But my overwhelming urge to try something out just got the better of me." Naruto said as he pulled out a summoning scroll. He pumped some chakra into it, and a puff of smoke ensued. When it cleared, Naruto could be seen…

Holding a large, rolled up carpet.

A _carpet_ for fuck's sake!

"… Oookaaayy… what the hell's the carpet for?" Kimimaro asked. Naruto simply smirked as he unrolled the carpet. He began to transfer his wind chakra to the underside of the carpet. The carpet began to float slowly into the air, and was able to support Naruto's weight as he got onto it. The fox boy's grin grew even wider as he stared at his gobsmacked teammates.

"I was always wondering why no shinobi had ever done this earlier, so I did it myself. It actually needs less effort to keep going than my Kaze Suihou. The only drawback is that I have to stay in contact with the carpet to keep it flying. But enough of that, c'mon, get on! The chakra layer that I put into this thing is enough to support a small elephant." Kimimaro and Haku got onto the carpet extremely cautiously, fearing that they would fall down and crash onto the ground. Miraculously, they didn't fall.

"Hold onto your panties, ladies; we're going for one helluva roller coaster ride!" Naruto exclaimed before he commanded his chakra to make the flying carpet dart forwards. Haku cried out in terror as they weaved through the trees like a swallow. Kimimaro reluctantly took one of his hands out of the death grip he had on the carpet's edge, and placed it reassuringly around Haku's waist. Haku seemed to relax a little bit, and leaned back into Kimimaro's muscular chest. Naruto watched his cousin out of the corner of his eye, and smirked as he watched the two grow closer to the couple that Naruto knew that they would become.

* * *

Naruto stopped his 'Magic Carpet' about five minutes later when they came upon the sight of a team from Kusagakure, crouched in a clearing. Naruto manoeuvered his carpet over to a small cluster of trees nearby to observe the Kusa nin. They were just sitting there, doing absolutely nothing. Naruto knew they had traps set up, and intended to find them.

"Futon: Fuyochi no jutsu!" Naruto muttered and closing his eyes as a jutsu-initiated breeze began to blow. From the blackness, clear and concise bluish lines appeared in his vision. These lines were objects that his Fuyochi wind's chakra bounced off of, sending the object's location back to his eyes. The brighter the object, the closer it was to him.

In the trees surrounding them, Naruto saw nothing. But surrounding the Kusa nin in a completely random pattern were dozens upon dozens of wires that launched hundreds of kunai, hidden in trees around them. For some odd reason, all of the kunai seemed to be aimed in the general direction of the Kusa nin.

"There's a shitload of wires around the nin that will turn anyone who trips one into a pincushion. But for some reason, the kunai will be launched in the general direction of those nin." Naruto stated as he stopped the jutsu.

"What do you reckon?" Kimimaro asked. Haku drew a senbon needle.

"We make a bunch of senbon or kunai or bone or sword K.B.s and try to hit them with them. If we don't hit them with those, the wires will probably be tripped and they'll be killed by their own kunai." She proposed. Naruto shrugged his shoulders.

"Very good. What she said." He pulled out a kunai and readies some chakra. Kimimaro had pushed out one of his entire finger bones that he had manipulated into a sort of drill shape. Team Bloodline tensed before they threw their weapon of choice. Three sets of seals were performed in unison, and three voices announced:

"Kunai/Senbon/Hone Kage Bunshin no jutsu!" one kunai multiplied into fifty. Two senbon needles multiplied into forty. And one bone drill/kunai multiplied into ten. One hundred projectiles rained down on the Kusa nin, who reacted too late, and were caught in the hailstorm of death. Their kunai trap was triggered as well, and Team Bloodline watched as the rest of the projectiles rained down on the dead bodies. After a moment of stillness, Team Bloodline each sent down a K.B. each, just in case there was another trap sprung. After removing another wire from each nin, they found an Earth Scroll. Satisfied, they jumped back onto Naruto's magic carpet and flew off towards the tower, high above the treetops to avoid any pesky competition.

* * *

Team Bloodline stood atop one of the balconies in the competition room that was to be used when the rest of the examinees. After arriving at the tower, they had opened the scrolls and summoned Anko, who told them of the test's true purpose; to outwit, outplay, and outlast the competition to deliver something to your destination.

On the third day of the competition, Team Bloodline watched as Anko stood off against Hatake Kakashi. Team Bloodline had asked why Anko wanted to challenge Kakashi, but all she had said was that she wanted to test out a 'secret weapon'. So now, every Jounin and the Hokage himself were watching as the two Jounin faced off. Many bets had been placed on the match. For example, Shiranui Genma had bet two S-ranked missions worth of pay that Kakashi would win, against Kurenai's wager of her grandmother's antique crystal flower that Anko would be victorious. Hayate was refereeing the match.

"Are both competitors ready?" Hayate asked. Kakashi nodded minutely, and Anko gave him two thumbs up. "Okay then, hajime!" he said as he jumped back from the competitors. Anko started the match by somehow launching a salvo of senbon needles at Kakashi from her sleeve. Kakashi moved out of the way, and pulled out a kunai just in time to block Anko's strike with Murasaki. Anko brought her sword up on a diagonal, utilizing the energy that was left from her previous strike. She spun around and delivered an even faster slash. Kakashi ducked, but one of his spikes of hair was still chopped off. Anko tried to kick Kakashi, but the Copy Ninja caught her leg and twisted it, throwing her off balance. In that second of opportunity, Kakashi snapped off a quick punch to Anko's side. She stumbled back, but spun around to ready another attack.

"Tsubaki no mai!" Anko announced. Kakashi uncovered his Sharingan eye to dodge the flurry of lightning fast stabs that Anko sent his way. But Sharingan or not, he still got nicked on the arms a couple of times. When Anko finished her stab fury, Kakashi flipped through a few seals.

"Katon: Endan!" he called, shooting small fireballs out of his mouth like bullets. Anko either evaded the fireballs, or blocked them with Murasaki. One fireball came at her faster than she thought it would, and she barely managed to pull off a Kawarimi with a kunai in time to avoid being cooked.

"Pretty good Anko; you've done well under Naruto and Hayate's sword tutelage." Kakashi praised Anko, who let a tiny upturn of her lips grace her face.

"But don't think that's going to be enough. Katon: Ryuuka no jutsu!" a large jet of fire shot from Kakashi's general mouth vicinity. Anko managed a one-handed cartwheel, but her trench coat still got a little singed. An evil smirk graced Anko's lips.

"Oh, I'm as sneaky as a snake Kakashi. And I think it's time to unveil my secret weapon!" Anko declared as she created a K.B. to attack Kakashi for a moment. Like a charm, Kakashi engaged the Bunshin, and destroyed it about eight seconds later. He looked through the smoke to see Anko with her hands glowing different colours. Her right hand had a reddish-brown light glowing on it, and her left hand was shining a bright blue. Anko had a shit eating grin on her face, and Kakashi looked wary. Naruto looked at Kimimaro, who also had a small smile on his face.

"You taught her chakra fusion?" Naruto asked. Kimimaro simply nodded, transfixed by the match that was going on in front of them. Naruto's eyes widened when he remembered what Anko's chakra affinities were.

'_That must mean that she can-'_

"Get ready Kakashi; you're about to feel the wrath of my secret weapon!" Anko boasted, bringing her hands together to form a large, swirling mass of dark green chakra.

"What the hell is that Anko?" Kakashi asked nervously. Anko simply smiled wider.

"A jutsu that hasn't been seen for over forty years." Was all she said. Kakashi was about to ask what it was again, but Anko answered, and everyone in the room received the shock of their lives.

"Mokuton: Jukai Kōtan!" Anko cried, slamming her hands into the ground. With a loud rumbling noise, tree branches almost as thick as Anko's body came shooting out from under the floor. Kakashi had not been expecting the Shodai's jutsu, and was caught in the burst of trees. They coiled around him like snakes, restraining his entire body.

Anko removed her hands from the ground, and got up rather weakly to observe her handiwork. The arena now looked rather like an arboretum, but with the same type of tree. Most of the tallest trees only rose about ten metres into the air, while the shorter ones were about two metres tall. But with all of the roots rising in arches and some trees grouped in little clusters, Anko had turned the arena into a perfect battlefield.

"Whoa…" Anko gasped, hunched over and panting quite a bit. "That jutsu… took a lot out of me." she began to stagger over to the stage slowly.

"Hey! What about me?" Kakashi demanded, struggling against the extremely thick trees that bound him.

"You're one of the best Jounin in the village Kakashi; you figure out a way to escape." Anko said smarmily before she was bombarded with questions by the flabbergasted Jounin and the Hokage. Kakashi swore under his breath.

* * *

Naruto stood calmly amongst the six other teams that made it through the competition. There was the Rookie Nine, Team Nine, that team from Suna, Kabuto's team, and of course, Team Bloodline. He listened loosely as Hayate explained the purpose of the preliminary rounds that they were about to start; to separate the lesser from the best of the best. His eyes drifted to Kabuto as the older boy bowed out of the exam. His eyes flicked back to the large TV screen that started to flash through randomized names. The first match pitted Sasuke against some guy called Akado Yoroi.

As Naruto watched from the balcony, he noticed a small mark on Sasuke's neck. Upon looking a little harder, Naruto discovered that it was a Ten no Juin, identical to the one on Anko-sensei's neck. It seemed to be affecting Sasuke's chakra flow, as the Uchiha used no jutsus. The highlight of the match was when Sasuke kicked Yoroi into the air, and used a heel drop to send him crashing through the trees that Anko had created a few days earlier. Of course, the Uchiha was announced the winner. After the match, he was carted off by Kakashi to get the seal examined. The next match pitted Sakura against Tsurugi Misumi. Misumi danced around Sakura's feeble attacks before defying the laws of physical anatomy by stretching his body like rubber around Sakura's body. He then proceeded to break all four of her limbs. The third match was Hinata against Neji. To Naruto's surprise, Neji did not start spouting off any bullshit about fate, but offered words of confidence to his cousin, which made her perk up a little bit. After a few minutes of trading Juken strikes, Neji landed a blow on Hinata's stomach that knocked her down. Before she could get up, Neji had a kunai to her throat.

"You fought well Hinata-sama." Neji praised her as he helped her up after he was declared the winner. Naruto grinned at Neji when the older Hyuuga passed him. Neji grinned back a little bit.

**Namikaze**** Naruto vs. Inuzuka Kiba**

"Alright Akamaru! Time to kick some dobe ass!" Kiba shouted, swaggering down to the arena. Naruto looked calmly up to the Jounin on the balconies with their Genin teams and located Kisame. The shark man locked eyes with Naruto and winked at him. Naruto winked back and looked calmly at Kiba.

"Everyone ready?" Hayate asked as he looked Naruto's way with a little grin. "Hajime!"

"Hey dobe, why don't you just give up now?" Kiba asked arrogantly. Naruto simply created a K.B. that bounded over to the door, and sealed it with a Doryuuheki.

"What the hell was the purpose of that dobe?" Kiba asked, bewildered. Naruto stared at the Inuzuka with a bored look on his face.

"Tell me Kiba; can you swim?" he asked. Kiba raised an eyebrow.

"What kind of question is that?!" he demanded. Naruto sighed in annoyance.

"Just answer the question and I'll tell you why I asked." Naruto responded.

"Fine, yes I can. Now why did you ask?" Kiba asked, looking rather impatient.

"This is why. Haku, Kimimaro, you owe me big time for this! Suiton: Bakusui Shōha!" Naruto shouted. From his mouth sprayed a tremendous torrent of water that filled up the arena with about fifteen feet of water. When mixed with Anko's trees, the arena now resembled a mangrove. Naruto was standing on top of the water, but Kiba was trying to stay afloat with his little puppy perched on his head. He glared angrily at Naruto.

"What the hell is this?! And how are you doing that?!" he bellowed, indicating Naruto standing on the water and getting a mouthful of water in the process. Naruto smirked.

"Well, it's simple Kiba; I just made this place my element. As for the standing on water; you know the tree walking exercise? Same basic principle." Naruto answered cryptically. Having done that exercise, Kiba tried to stand on the water, but failed abysmally, falling back in.

'_Not even considering water is a semi-permeable substance.__ What an idiot.'_ Naruto thought as he watched Kiba try again and fail to stand on the water. But the blonde was surprised when the dog boy got it on his third try. Kiba growled in annoyance before he handed Akamaru a small pill. The puppy's fur turned bright red and he roared like a lion.

"Let's go Akamaru! Jujin Bunshin no jutsu! Shikyaku no jutsu!" Akamaru transformed into an identical copy of his now feral looking master, and they both charged at Naruto on all fours. As they grew closer, Naruto stopped letting chakra flow to his feet and sank beneath the water. Kiba stopped his charge and looked around. Before he could register the bubbling at his feet, Naruto shot out of the water and delivered an uppercut to Kiba's jaw. In a puff of smoke, Akamaru dropped the Henge and fell onto a tree branch. Kiba whipped around from watching his dog and tried to slash at Naruto with his claws. Naruto jumped away and disappeared under the water again.

'_He may have gotten better, but he's still a dobe. That trick won't work again!'_ Kiba thought. For a moment, he waited. Naruto rose slowly out of the water to Kiba's right. Not stopping to consider any dangers, Kiba rushed at Naruto and punched him in the back of the head.

Only to have the blonde turn into water. Momentarily distracted from transferring chakra to his feet, Kiba sank back into the mangrove's water. After a moment, he noticed something odd; the water felt heavy.

"Gotcha! Hyoro no jutsu!" Naruto exclaimed as he popped his head out of the water. A dome of water formed around Kiba which immediately hardened into a thick sphere of ice. Kiba started to bang on his freezing prison and yell indistinguishable words.

"I would suggest you save your air Kiba; you'll run out of oxygen in about three minutes." Naruto said calmly to Kiba, holding up three fingers. Kiba immediately shut up and started to try and claw his way out of the ice sphere. Seeing Kiba thrash about in his prison made it start to swing back and forth, which gave Naruto a nasty idea. He started to push the Hyoro near the bottom of it, making the sphere start to spin. Kiba started to bang on the sphere and yell silently as he tumbled about the sphere. Naruto started to laugh as he watched the dog boy turn a light shade of green. He stopped after Kiba vomited in the sphere and cracked it open, sending the Inuzuka tumbling into the water. Kiba floated to the surface, nearly unconscious.

"Pathetic, _dobe._ I didn't even have to use my swords in order to beat you." Naruto spat.

"What… swords?" Kiba asked weakly. Naruto indicated the tattoos on his arms.

"M swords are sealed inside these tattoos." Naruto said shortly.

"As Inuzuka Kiba is unable to continue, the winner is Namikaze Naruto." Hayate announced. Anko, Kisame, Haku and Kimimaro started to clap, and Hayate slapped Naruto a high five. Several of the Jounin were making their way over to the blocked door, probably to 'uncork' it.

"Hey! Hey!" Naruto called, getting their attention. "Leave it. Think of keeping from drowning as another task to overcome in this exam." He indicated. The Jounin stopped for a moment, considering Naruto's words, and shrugged as they walked away from the sealed door. Naruto jumped back up to the balcony and watched the next matches. Chuuken Mato was pitted against Kankuro. After dispelling the Henge on the puppet called Karasu that Kankuro used, the match went downhill for Mato from there. In the end, he was poisoned and exhausted of chakra from standing on the water. He had to be carted out extremely quickly to avoid dying.

**Kaguya Kimimaro vs. Sabaku no Temari**

Kimimaro grinned as he shrugged off his trench coat and jumped over the railing and landed with a little plop on the surface of the mangrove. Temari jumped through the air and floated down to face Kimimaro on her fan. She blushed a little bit when she got a look at Kimimaro's trim body. The Kaguya noticed and flexed his arm for her. A tiny trickle of blood made its way down Temari's nose. Hayate was smirking as he watched Kimimaro work his charm on the Suna girl.

"Hajime!" he announced stepping back. Kimimaro and Temari engaged in a staredown, which they seemed to be equally good at. Discreetly, the tips of Kimimaro's finger bones started to poke out of his fingers. He smirked lightly at Temari, causing her to grip her fan a little bit tighter.

"Teshi Sendan!" Kimimaro announced, bringing his hands up and shooting his finger bones out. It was barely visible, but Temari swung her fan extremely quickly, stopping the bones dead in their tracks. Kimimaro seemed unfazed as he lowered his arms.

"Just as I expected; you're a middle to long range wind user." Kimimaro stated. Temari looked rather unimpressed.

"So what of it?" she asked. Her eyes grew to the size of dinner plates when Kimimaro's shoulder blades started to poke out of his shoulders. She turned white as a sheet when he pulled them out, and saw that they resembled a pair of ninja-to.

"It means if I get close enough to you, you won't be able to stop me." Kimimaro retorted before starting a surprisingly fast dash towards the blonde.

"Don't think that getting close to me is gonna be that easy! Kamaitachi no jutsu!" Temari cried, swinging her now fully opened fan. A large vortex of wind blasted from the Suna girl and headed straight for the Kaguya. But other than dashing good looks and an uncanny mastery over anything to do with a sword, Kimimaro had chakra control almost good enough to be a medic nin. And with that chakra control, Kimimaro released a burst of chakra from his feet while jumping, sending him rocketing through the air. While doing a flip through the air, Kimimaro threw his two swords at Temari like a set of kunai. She flipped her fan to block the two bone swords with some difficulty, completely oblivious to the speeding human missile that was coming towards her. Temari looked up when a shadow appeared over her, and raised her fan to block Kimimaro's fierce flying kick. Unfazed even slightly, Kimimaro flipped backwards, and kicked some water into Temari's face, blinding her for a second. Temari spluttered and shook her head to get the water out of it, and was unable to stop Kimimaro's forceful hook punch to her jaw. As she keeled to the side, Kimimaro kicked her, sending her sprawling across the water.

"Nice try, bone boy." Said a distinctly smug, feminine voice from Kimimaro's left. He whipped his head over to see Temari un-Henge her disguise as her fan. He looked at the Temari he had sent flying to see that it was actually her fan under a Kawarimi.

"Not bad Temari; you tricked me. But now… you have no weapon." Kimimaro said as he turned to her. Temari simply smirked wider and pulled a pair of smaller fans out from her dress.

"And what the hell are those going to do?" Kimimaro asked, barely containing his laughter at the pitiful sight.

"Watch." Temari snapped back as twelve knives snapped out of the middle of each of the fans like switchblades. Kimimaro's twitching mouth stopped like the snap of a finger. Temari swung her right fan at Kimimaro, who ducked the strike. Kimimaro did a split jump to avoid Temari's swipe with her left fan. He almost didn't expect Temari to be able to pull the knives out of the fan. He raised himself onto his toes to avoid a thrown knife that was aimed in the direction of his 'Little Kimi'. He looked up at Temari, white as a sheet.

'_She's gonna do something worse than killing me!'_ his inner voice squeaked in terror. Unfortunately for him, if he were to make a bone shield around his 'Groin Goodies', it would be irreversible. He started to push his shoulder blade out again, this time making the blade twice as long. With one final push of chakra, the highly elongated sword popped out of Kimimaro's shoulder. When fully out, the manipulated bone looked rather like a pike instead of a sword. Kimimaro swung his bone pike at Temari, who blocked it with her fan. Another blade shot out at Kimimaro, presumably from some sort of chakra-triggered launcher in the fan. Kimimaro leaned to his right, letting only a few of his hairs get cut off. Their match continued for another five minutes until Temari ran out of knives in her fans, and Kimimaro's pike was broken by Temari using a mini Kamaitachi no jutsu. It was then that the jutsus started to come out.

"Futon: Daitoppa!" Temari cried. A huge column of air formed and rocketed straight for Kimimaro.

"Suiton: Suikōdan no jutsu!" Kimimaro countered. A geyser of water shot up behind him and took the form of a gigantic shark with extremely sharp teeth. The water shark slammed into the large battering ram of air, effectively making the two cancel out. As the sheets of water rained down, Temari missed Kimimaro's approach until it was too late.

"Moroha no mai!" Kimimaro announced, making Temari whip to her left. Kimimaro slashed her right arm deeply with a wakizashi-like bone from his upper arm, making her flinch. Twirling the small blade, he poked through her left arm. He spun to the right, and slashed her right thigh, making her drop to her knee. Finally, Kimimaro jumped into the air with a spin and cut Temari's left thigh, making her fall to the surface of the water. As she looked up, Kimimaro pointed his small bone sword at her face with a grin.

"Good match, Temari." He said before he threw his bone away and helped her up. Temari felt too weak to form words; those cuts were bleeding quite a bit.

"Shosha, Kaguya Kimimaro." Hayate announced. Team Bloodline, Anko and Kisame started to clap again. The next matched passed quickly. Shino defeated Shikamaru with some difficulty, having been knocked about by the Nara's shadow. Gaara almost killed Lee, who had had one of his legs crushed, and was about to finish him when Gai intervened. Tenten was pitted against Chouji, and defeated him with the clever use of an explosive weapons move that she called the 'Hi no Enjin' after getting knocked around a little bit by the human behemoth. Feeling rather chivalrous, Naruto jumped down to the ring and carried his 'princess' back up to the balcony. Tenten started to protest and squirm in Naruto's grasp, but he silenced her with a kiss. And finally, Haku was pitted against Yamanaka Ino. Ino looked rather confident, automatically assuming that this new girl probably spent more of her time on her looks than her ninja training, seeing as she was almost as beautiful as the platinum blonde. Almost.

"Why don't you just give up? Against my mind techniques, nobody can defeat me." Ino arrogantly proclaimed. Haku simply pulled out a small pocket mirror and examined her reflection. A vein started to twitch on Ino's forehead after a few seconds of Haku not replying.

"Hey! Don't ignore me!" Ino snapped at Haku, who gave no indication that she had heard Ino, and twirled a loose strand of her brown hair on her left index finger.

"HEY! Did you hear me?! Answer me!" Ino cried at Haku. The Hyoton girl puckered her lips to even out the slightly smudged coating of lipstick on her bottom lip.

"PAY ATTENTION TO ME!" Ino screeched, making several people wince and cover their ears at the sheer volume of her voice. Haku simply looked over her mirror with half-lidded eyes and a bored expression.

"Did you say something Narcissus?" Haku asked/taunted. Ino's face turned a purplish-red in indignant rage. Hayate was doing his best to contain his laughter; meaning his fist was shoved into his mouth and his eyes were watering as he hunched over.

"Are… (wheeze) both competitors (snort) ready?" he choked out. Haku put her mirror back into her shuriken pouch and crossed her arms. Ino slid into a flawed taijutsu stance.

"(cough) Hajime!" Hayate announced as he backpedaled from the centre of the arena. Ino began a mad dash that any kind of half-assed ninja could have exploited and gotten a kunai into her ribcage. Ino threw a sloppy hook punch at Haku's face, which she dodged by simply stepping back a step. Ino used the momentum she had built up from the punch to deliver a spinning kick. Haku evaded this attack, and swept Ino's foot out from beneath her. Ino fell on her ass, crying out in alarm and pain. She glared angrily up at Haku, who simply looked at her with an almost pitying gaze.

"And this, ladies and gentlemen, is a fangirl kunoichi. They are often weak and defenseless creatures that seek the attention, and praise of the alpha male shinobi. Often, said alpha male is aloof and ignorant of the fangirl kunoichi, mainly because they spend more time on grooming themselves and attempting to catch the alpha male's eye than becoming a strong kunoichi. Due to this tendency, the fangirl kunoichi will often die on lower ranked missions, increasing the general kunoichi death rate, and making female ninja look bad." Haku said, almost as though she were narrating a documentary. Naruto, Kimimaro, Anko, Kisame and Hayate were snickering quietly. Ino's face was turning redder and redder as Haku degraded her.

"SHUT UP!" she screamed, and began attacking Haku in a berserker rage. Haku actually found herself having to speed up to avoid Ino's wild and random attacks. But after about three minutes, Ino started to sink into the water, signifying that she was running out of chakra. In a last ditch attack attempt, Ino emptied her kunai and shuriken pouch at Haku, who looked nothing short of bored.

"Suiton: Suiryuudan no jutsu." Haku stated tonelessly. A huge geyser of water shot up in front of Haku, and took the form of a serpentine dragon. The kunai and shuriken were stopped in their tracks, and the water dragon slammed into Ino, buffeting her about and under the water. Haku simply stood on the water calmly, waiting for Ino to surface. And sure enough, the waterlogged blonde floated to the surface of the mangrove, unconscious.

"Shosha, Koori Haku." Hayate announced. Once again, Team Bloodline and their senseis clapped. With the end of the matches, the winners were called down to the stage area after Naruto drained the water. They were asked to draw a number from the Hokage's hat to determine who they would fight in the finals. The match ups were:

Namikaze Naruto vs. Uchiha Sasuke

Koori Haku vs. Tsukiakari Tenten

Aburame Shino vs. Sabaku no Kankuro

Hyuuga Neji vs. Tsurugi Misumi

Kaguya Kimimaro vs. Sabaku no Gaara

Naruto smirked at an opportunity to dice the Uchiha-teme's pride into tiny little pieces. Kimimaro didn't outwardly show it, but Naruto could tell by his eyes that his pale teammate was a little unnerved at having to fight the murderous psychopath. Haku looked a little unhappy at having to fight a friend. Hayate then told them that they had a month to prepare for the finals, which would take place at the Konoha Stadium.

XXXXX

Team Bloodline and their senseis walked together with Team Nine, minus Lee, out of the forest.

"So, what do we do now?" Kimimaro asked.

"Well duh! We train our freezing asses off, stupid!" Naruto exclaimed like it was the most obvious thing in the world.

"Yeah, you're probably gonna need to. But that can come later! After we visit Lee, we gotta celebrate! You're going to the finals!" Anko shouted, pumping her fist into the air.

"**YEAH!"** Came eight cries simultaneously.

After gorging on barbeque and dango and other such junk food, night found Team Bloodline and the entire Team Nine curled up on multiple couches in the Namikaze estate, watching action movies such as 'Land of Hellfire' and 'Midnight Gorefest'.

**There we go! The Chuunin Exams! R&R, and here are the translations:**

**Seihyo- **Western Ice

**Tsubaki, Yuukaku, Tessenka, Moroha no mai- **Dance of the Camellia/Orchid/Clematis, Double-Edge Dance

**Hoshizora- **Starry Sky

**Kage Bunshin- **Shadow Replication

**Tsuchi Bunshin- **Earth Replication

**Katon: Gokakyu no jutsu-** Fire Release: Great Fireball Technique

**Katon: Karyu Endan- **Fire Release: Fire Dragon Flame Missile

**Futon: Daitoppa-** Wind Release: Great Breakthrough

**Hyoro no jutsu- **Ice Release: Ice Prison Technique

**Suiro no jutsu-** Water Prison Technique

**Hyoton: Hyodan no jutsu- **Ice Release: Ice Bullet Technique

**Sen'eijashu- **Hidden Shadow Snake Hand

**Doton: Doryuuheki- **Earth Release: Earth Style Wall

**Futon: Fuyochi no jutsu- **Wind Release: Wind Foresight Technique

**Katon: Endan- **Fire Release: Fire Bullet

**Mokuton: Jukai Kotan- **Wood Release: Birth of Trees

**Suiton: Bakusui Shoha-** Water Release: Exploding Water Shockwave

**Jujin Bunshin- **Beast Human Clone

**Shikyaku no jutsu-** Four Legs Technique

**Teshi Sendan-** Finger Bullet Drill

**Kamaitachi no jutsu- **Cutting Whirlwind Technique

**Suiton: Suikodan no jutsu- **Water Release: Water Shark Missile Technique

**Hi no Enjin- **Ring of Fire

**Suiton: Suiryuudan no jutsu- **Water Release: Water Dragon Misslie Technique


	7. A Lost Traveler

A Swordsman's Road

**A Swordsman's Road**

**By: Dirty Reid**

**Chapter 7: A Lost Traveler**

**A.N.: Sorry that it took so long to update this fic, but as you know, I have others to work on. But here you go; a filler chapter full of swashbuckling ninja action!**

* * *

As the sun crested the horizon over Konoha, the morning songbirds began to sing their new symphony. A single bluebird opened with a soft and staccato solo. A sextet of finches came in to accompany the soloist after a few moments. Then a duo of larks. A hunting osprey joined them. When the sun had capped the trees of Konoha, the symphony had moved into its third movement. By then, the civilians of Konoha had flooded the streets and went about their business, or had stopped to listen to the masterpiece of nature.

The symphony was rudely interrupted by a loud cry from the Namikaze manor, courtesy of the heiress to the Koori clan.

"HENTAIIIIIIIIII!!" she screeched.

"WAAAAAAAAUUUUUUUUGH!" came a terrified yell in reply.

_**CRACK **_went the heiress' fist against the Kaguya's hardened bones. With a loud crumbling of bricks, drywall and wood, a pale form in a white robe flew out of the Namikaze mansion and landed in the streets. Anyone near enough to the crash site would have tried to comprehend what would have been so frightening to warrant such a terrified look on the normally cool and impassive Kaguya's face.

The answer to that thought was a red-faced and panting Haku. Her sleek brown hair was strewn about her face; she was panting heavily, and was clad only in a short towel she had snatched up when she caught Kimimaro peeping at her.

Back in his bed, Namikaze Naruto grinned in mirth at the poor pervert's misfortune before rising up and stretching his arms.

* * *

Naruto sat at the large marble counter in his mansion's sunroom, casually munching on a flapjack. Haku and Naruto had cooked up a large buffet-style breakfast. Eggs, bacon, flapjacks, a bowl of fruit, orange juice, coffee and sausages were plentiful in their breakfast.

Why enough food to satisfy two Akimichi? The finals were coming up in ten days, and Team Bloodline was going on an A-rank mission for extra combat practice. The Hokage had been reluctant to grant it to them, but he had eventually caved. Plus, Anko and Hayate had slept over after exhausting themselves during a battle royale the previous day.

Soon enough, the deliciously enticing scents of the food reached the three snoozing Jounin. Kisame practically floated down to the breakfast by his nose, clad in only his wool pants, leaving his body-builder-like upper body exposed to the two cousins. Anko sauntered down to breakfast in a skimpy silk lavender nightgown that fell to just above her knees, still only half awake. Hayate came down in a set of sleeping shorts and an undershirt that was as rumpled as his hair. Five minutes later, a dirty and ruffled-looking Kimimaro swaggered into the kitchen, completely unharmed.

As the Kisame and Kimimaro wordlessly made their way towards the freshly brewed pot of coffee, Naruto had to bite the inside of his mouth to keep a sly grin off his face. Over the past three days or so, Naruto had observed that Kisame and Kimimaro usually always had the caffeinated Western drink in the morning. So this morning, he decided to make a nasty little change to their early morning indulgence. No, he hadn't slipped laxatives or marijuana into the grinds. He had done something rather simple.

He had replaced all of the sugar with salt.

Naruto continued to keep his laughter in as Kisame and Kimimaro each added three teaspoons of 'sugar' to their coffee. He continued to look calm and impassive as they sat down, but his blood turned to the ice he used in his jutsu when Hayate and Anko poured themselves some coffee and simply dumped 'sugar' into their coffee. A bead of sweat began to roll down the side of his head and his face began to drain of colour as the three Jounin and his Kaguya buddy sat down. Unfortunately for him, Haku, perceptive as always, noticed his paling face.

"Is something wrong Naruto-kun?" she asked quietly, setting down her glass of orange juice as she set her concerned ice blue eyes on him. Naruto quickly shook his head and looked at her with a little grin.

"I'm fine Haku-chan! Just a little nausea spell or something!" Naruto replied sunnily, turning back to his meal but keeping an eye on the coffee-drinkers.

This was going to be hilarious, but painful.

To Naruto's further increasing mirth and dread, all four of them took a drink of their coffee at pretty much the exact same time. His face started to turn red when they responded.

Kimimaro's eyes snapped completely open as he stopped mid-swallow. Kisame puckered his cheeks and the gills near his neck began to flutter. Anko's eye began to twitch uncontrollably. Hayate stopped drinking and started to make sounds that seemed like he was being smothered by a pillow.

"MMMMMM! MMMMPHM!" he said before he started to whip around in his seat, finally getting up and sprinting over to the sink and spraying his mouthful of coffee into it. Kisame Anko and Kimimaro were right behind him. In the end, Kisame spewed his out the window, Anko spat hers onto the patio deck, and Kimimaro sprayed his on Kisame.

The dam burst and Naruto started howling with laughter, clutching his sides in pain as tears rolled from his eyes and his face turned red. Haku was tittering like a dignified lady.

After about thirty more seconds of laughing, Naruto's breath caught in his throat when he felt a huge aura of KI being delivered to him. He slowly raised his head to see four murderous faces. Anko's eyes had gone from their sleep-clogged but pretty brown to devil red. Hayate's hair was floating around like a bunch of messy tentacles. A pair of bull-like bone horns had popped out of Kimimaro's forehead and he kept dragging his foot along the floor. Kisame, still covered in coffee and spit, had bared his serrated triangular teeth and was salivating profusely. Naruto shivered when the shark man opened his mouth and licked his lips with a pale grey tongue that was oddly reptilian.

"Ya know Naruto," Kisame began in an oddly distorted voice that sounded rather like the Kyuubi's, "I never told anyone this, but I was injected with a great white shark's DNA as an experiment by the Mizukage just after my mother became pregnant. Out of the ten children injected with the DNA of different sharks to become the 'Kirigakure Swimmer Squad', I was the only one to survive. Aside from my dashing good looks, the shark DNA also gives me a sort of 'frenzy mode' where I go berserk after experiencing fairly strong emotions. Said mode usually entails me _eating_ whatever pissed me off. And right now, _you have PISSED ME OFF!_" Kisame roared before he jumped across the table and took a snap at Naruto. The blonde shot away from the table and out the door, three Jounin and Kaguya teammate on his heels.

"HEEEEEEEEEEEEEELP! THE SHARK MAN'S GONNA EAT ME!" he screeched as he ran through the streets of Konoha. Back in the sunroom, Haku turned back from watching the goose chase and took a small sip of her orange juice as though without a care in the world.

'_Dumbass cousin,'_ she thought to herself.

* * *

Two hours of running and screaming and highly destructive jutsu later, Team Bloodline, Kisame and Hayate stood in Sarutobi's office. The aged man regarded the six with a raised eyebrow.

"Do I really want to know?" he asked. Naruto was covered in cuts and bruises and dirt. A nice shiner that matched the 'ink' of his 'tattoos' was receding slowly over his left eye, and he had his knees crossed inwards as though the pressure soothed his groin.

Kisame's hair was ruffled, but stood up as usual. Anko's peacock-like ponytail was even more wild than usual. Hayate had some colour in his usually pasty white face and a few beads of sweat dotted his brow. Kimimaro looked perfectly calm, but several small spots on his skin signified where his bones had poked out, not to mention there were holes in the shoulders of his tight black shirt and the knees of his black skinny jeans.

"Probably not," Haku replied. Of the six in the office, Haku looked perfectly normal, with her well pressed dark aqua gi, perfectly straight hair and slightly roomy black pants complete with Seihyo on her left hip.

Sarutobi shrugged, "Thought not," he said more to himself. "Anyways, I called on you six for a special mission. Mariko-san, you can come in now!" The side door on Konoha's highest echelon's office opened and a real sight walked into the room.

'_Yeesh!'_ Naruto thought as he laid eyes on Mariko. The sight before him was a slovenly-looking lady probably in her forties that could easily be mistaken for an ugly man dressed in expensive drag. She had a squarish-looking body that was all fat, curly black hair that was greying in spots and a pale and waxy face that had some nice wrinkles under her eyes. Naruto leaned to his right and raised his head to Kimimaro's ear.

"Imagine having _that _lady jerking you off." he whispered. Kimimaro's eyes opened wider before he slapped his hand over his mouth when he started to laugh. Hayate must have heard because he seemed to be biting his lips in an attempt to contain silent laughter.

Mariko didn't seem to notice. She strode as elegantly up to Sarutobi's desk... well, as elegantly as her rolls would allow her. This only fueled Naruto's imagination, which had just been thrown into the filthy gutter, making him feel like he would hurt himself if he laughed any harder. In his head, he could hear Kyuubi roaring with mirth along with him.

"I will allow you to brief the undertakers of your quandary Mariko-san." Sarutobi said politely and shooting the giggling shinobi a stern stare in a failed attempt to silence them.

"... My daughter has been kidnapped." she said in a funnily deep voice. Apparently Kisame and Anko could read minds, because they seemed to have heard Naruto's first comment, and hearing Mariko's voice made them bite back peals of laughter. Mariko paused for a moment and started to look annoyed.

"... I am _so _not paying you for this," she said, making them shut up immediately.

"Sorry," Kisame said, speaking for the entire sextet, "you said that your daughter had been kidnapped?" he asked.

"Yes. She was supposed to be married to the son of the Water Daimyo in order to promote good will between the two countries. Something to do with Konoha stealing a Kirigakure nin or something like that." she said offhandedly. Six sets of eyes, Sarutobi's included, flicked to Kisame, who twitched nervously.

"Anyways, she disappeared from the manor they were supposed to be married in, and I later received a tip-off that she had been kidnapped and taken to the Ghost Island." Mariko explained. Kisame's mouth dropped open.

"The Ghost Island? Forget it, that's way too dangerous for the kids, despite how experienced they may be." Kisame dismissed the unasked question of whether or not they would save her daughter and tried to soften the heated glares sent his way by Team Bloodline.

Dense as he may have been, Naruto knew of the strange little island. He had heard whispers of shinobi not returning from the place amongst his unprejudiced ANBU guards.

"Look, Mariko-san, it's not that we're afraid, far from it! It's just that we've got this thing about death; it's not us." Anko said somewhat lamely. Mariko's eyes were turning a puffy reddish colour as tears burned them.

"P-please! You of Konoha are the only shinobi I c-can turn to now! I take back what I said before! I'll give you anything! Did you hear me?! _Anything_!" she said as she approached hysterics. The six sword users shared glances.

"... Anything?" Kimimaro asked incredulously.

"Yes, anything!" Mariko answered hysterically. The Kaguya looked over at his younger blonde counterpart, his unspoken crush, Naruto's two teachers and his old master. Naruto knew exactly what Kimimaro was thinking. But just to make sure, he leaned upwards and whispered into the pale boy's ear.

"Six figures each?" he whispered.

"Six figures each," Kimimaro responded. Naruto nodded and looked over at Mariko.

"Okay," he said slowly, "we'll do it for... 600K." he finished, provoking many amusing responses from his fellows. Mariko seemed to choke on her breath. Haku's mouth dropped open in surprise and anger. Sarutobi choked on a cloud of smoke from his pipe.

"_Six hundred thousand?!_" Mariko shrieked. Hayate had caught on and raised one of his eyebrows.

"Well, if you will not pay us I suppose you will have to find another group of shinobi to help you." he said flippantly as he started to slowly turn away.

"Alright alright, I'll pay you, just save my daughter, please!" Mariko cried. Five of the six nin had shit-eating grins on their faces and ryou signs in their eyes. Haku just looked scandalized.

"Alright Mariko-san, we'll do it. Where was your daughter last seen?" Kisame asked as he fixed his beady eyes on the fat woman.

"I received word that she was last seen on a small island just west of the Ghost Island and was being boarded onto a boat by a very tall and burly man carrying a staff that had a weird blade. I think it was shaped kind of like a fish tail." Mariko informed them. Though none of them saw it, a look of strange curiosity and quite possibly fear brushed Kisame's face as something flashed through his mind.

"Team Bloodline and company, you have your mission and information. Put it to good use. Dismissed," Sarutobi commanded. The six bowed politely and exited the Hokage's office swiftly.

* * *

"I always knew I could corrupt you into becoming a greedy bastard someday Hayate-sensei." Naruto said with a smirk as they left the tower. Hayate gave his pupil a wan smile and shrugged.

"I think I like being a greedy bastard," he replied.

"Now you're talkin'!" Anko exclaimed and slapped Hayate gently on the back.

"Say Kisame-sensei," Kimimaro began, catching his sensei's attention, "could you tell us a little bit more about the Swimming Team Project or whatever it was called?" the other four ninja looked rather interested about the information on Kisame's past as well. The shark man looked doubtful, as though the story caused him pain, but he shrugged his shoulders.

"Okay, sure. Like I said, there were supposed to be ten of us, all of which were to be injected with the DNA of a different shark. Our purpose would be to infiltrate enemy water blockades undetected and weaken their forces. I was injected with the DNA of a great white shark, making me the larger powerhouse of the team. The second member, Hayabusa Ryu, was given the DNA of a Mako shark; making him the ninja who would run by and slice your head off before you knew you were dead. Then there was Yagima Kon. He was supposed to be part Carpet shark. Meaning? His skin should've been a kind of mottled brownish-gold mixed with black and green. His job would have been to camouflage himself on the floor of shallow waters near enemy territory and ambush them when they came near him. Another one, Yukino Sarajin, was given the DNA of a bull shark. He was designated as the team's berserker because he would have been able to bash his way through crowds of enemies and not die from damage because he was supposed to be about seven feet of pure muscle. These three made it through birth, but all died later. The other six never made it out of their wombs, so I didn't ever know their names." Kisame took a small breath as he finished his explanation.

"... Wow," said Naruto, "that's quite a story. Shame that the others are dead though; you wouldn't be considered such a freak Kisame!" Anko laughed at the unexpected burn. Kisame did nothing, but Naruto was pretty sure he saw some drool trickling down Kisame's chin. For the rest of the trip out of the country, the blonde kept his insults to himself.

* * *

Naruto was more than a little creeped out when he set foot on the island. Their boat ride over had been quite calm. The fog that enshrouded the island was what had set Naruto on edge. A tiny clearing in the mist allowed the six a glimpse of the island. The sparse trees just beyond the gravelly shore were overhung with moss and other such lichens on their drooping leaves and greyish bark. The browned grass was mottled with green and often simply patches of dirt. Grey and black and purplish clouds hung above the island as though promising rain but not promising a time.

"If we were shooting a horror movie, this would be the place I would go." Anko commented.

"No time for the scenery everybody; we have to rescue the princess!" Haku reprimanded them. Naruto looked down from the barely visible cliffs in the distance and followed his cousin as she ran into the jungle.

The six sword users kept themselves in a tight circle. They did not want to leave themselves or anyone else open to attack on foreign turf. But surprisingly, they did not meet any opposition. The forest remained quiet, save for the noises of strange animals. Oddly enough, none of them felt reassured.

Shortly afterwards, the mist became so thick that none of them could see more than a couple feet in front of their faces, forcing them to stop.

"Think we should wait until this clears up?" Naruto asked as he turned about to stare at the faintly detailed shadows that were his teammates and teachers.

"If anything about this mission is like a crappy ninja movie, it's the fog that doesn't clear up just as the hero or heroes are about to be ambushed by about a zillion enemies." Hayate said. No sooner had the final words left his mouth that Naruto heard the faint but distinct _whish-whish-whish _of speeding shuriken.

"Down!" Haku barked. The six Konoha nin ducked just as the handful of projectiles sliced through where their heads had been mere seconds before. Three rings of metal, a pair of sickening squelches and a faint pop signified the six were ready for retaliation.

"Stay sharp you five; I can tell where they are, you can't." Kisame warned them.

"What? How?" Naruto asked as he tightened his grip on Caduceus.

"One thing all of the Swimmer Squad were supposed to have in common was the organ that is the source of a shark's sixth sense; the Ampulae of Lorenzini. They allow sharks to detect tiny pulses of bioelectricity from their prey. That's how hammerhead sharks find stingrays in the sand, and that's how I find my victims in the Kirigakure no jutsu. Pretty sweet eh?" Kisame said with a small amount of cockiness in his voice.

Naruto was looking up in thought, "... so, that means that if you were swimming along a shoreline at night, you could watch a hot couple getting jiggy with it on the beach by seeing their bioelectricity?" he asked. Kimimaro sputtered with laughter as Kisame's eyes bugged out.

"Eww! Who tossed your mind into the gutter and never picked it up Naruto-kun?" Haku asked indignantly. Naruto didn't answer, as he was preoccupied with ducking a fist.

"Less talk, more hack and slash Haku-chan!" Naruto said as he took a swipe at the shadow of his opponent. Haku listened and joined her kooky cousin in the assault on the shadow of a man. Not expecting help, the man was quickly felled.

Kimimaro, senses honed to near perfection, bent his head to the right to avoid a diagonal hit from a sword or a bludgeon, he couldn't tell and he didn't want to find out. He swung his head back and brought his body with him, augmenting his right patella into a sharp spine. The wielder swung his torso back, but did not manage to avoid getting slashed across the chest, if his grunt of pain was any tip. Kimimaro continued to spin about, cocking his augmented leg back and springing it forwards, hoping to slam it into his target's chest. He was only slightly miffed when his boot-covered foot didn't connect as his target lunged backwards, but he relished the solid impact of the extending lance that was the rear of his carpal bone into the flesh of his target.

Kisame began to salivate as adrenalin pumped through his veins. He did not draw Samehada immediately; his more primal mind was in command. When he was in control of his emotions, such as if he were on an assassination mission, he would use calculated strikes or shave his mark into bacon. But when he grew excited in anticipation of a fight, his testosterone levels, already heightened because of his shark DNA, skyrocketed with his adrenalin, making him go into a berserker frenzy. Kisame let out a roar not associated with a shark and charged off into the mist. He met a blur of a person almost immediately. With adrenalin sharpened reflexes, Kisame charged in under the shadow's guard and delivered a crushing headbutt to their chest. He heard something crack as the shadow fell to their knees, and he heard an even louder crack when he smashed an uppercut into their jaw. Smelling a second approach, Kisame spun about and brought his still raised right fist downwards onto the head of the second target. He grimaced when he felt stiff metal meet his fist. He lurched his body upwards and to the left, snapping his leg out into a sharp roundhouse kick and savouring the sound of his combat shoe smacking into flesh and light armour. He felt something scrape along his shoe and spared it a quick glance.

What he saw made him regain some of his senses. His shoe looked as though it had been shredded by tiny blades where he had kicked his opponent.

'_Armour that shreds? That sounds like... wait... no, that's impossible... Not a chance in hell. Mariko probably mistook it for a naginata.'_ Kisame thought before he sprang off into the mist.

* * *

About ten minutes of hacking and slashing and pulverizing later, Team Bloodline and their senseis sheathed their stained swords.

"Nothin' like a little workout before the real shit-kicking begins eh?" Anko asked in a wheezy voice as sweat dotted her brows.

"Good for taking anger out, bad for future fights." Haku replied while flicking the blood off Seihyo and sliding it back into its sheath. While the five normal ninja talked quietly amongst themselves, Kisame was pooling his chakra just under his skin, magnetizing himself and drawing the mist in towards him. Team Bloodline Anko and Hayate stopped their quiet chatter when they noticed the swirling mist surrounding Kisame almost like a cloud. When the mist had been completely purged from the area, the solid wall of water around Kisame dropped to the ground.

The shark man ignored the questions and crouched by a relatively intact corpse. He ran his index fingers up the armour and brought it up to his face, showing multiple tiny shreds in his blue skin. He looked further up the body and cringed when he saw the helmet the person was wearing. It looked somewhat like an ANBU mask, but lining the lower third of the mask were dozens of extensions shaped like narrow and grooved teeth. On the 'cheeks' of the masks were five thin black slits parallel to each other. Almost like gills.

"... Kisame-sensei?" Naruto asked hesitantly, "this mean anything to you?" Kisame stood up and looked up at the cliffs.

"I have a hunch," he said quietly, "I just hope I'm wrong."

* * *

They didn't encounter any more opposition on their trek to the cliffs. They started to get edgy when nothing happened on the climb up the steep rock faces.

None of them expected the loop they were thrown for when they got to the top of the cliff.

Carved out of some huge boulder on the top of the cliffs was a crude-looking black castle. A black thunderhead, darker than the rest, loomed over the castle, flashing lightning every once in a while. When a compound flash rolled around, Naruto's blood went cold for a second when he saw an eerie silhouette cast by the castle. The oddly conical main wing, combined with the bullet-shaped gate and circular windows made the creepy castle look like the head of a shark.

"Is it just me or do sharks seem to be a recurring theme on this island?" Hayate asked rhetorically.

"C'mon, let's get this over with! This place is creeping me out!" Haku hissed as she crested the cliffs and began to slink along the ground. The five remaining shinobi quickly followed her.

Again, they were unhindered in their approach to their mark. They were starting to feel extremely scared when they infiltrated the castle without meeting any enemy ninja. Not even any traps.

'_Whoever runs this place must be either one of the the laziest or one of the most powerful ninja out there.'_ Anko thought to herself. They traveled through the halls of the castle, encountering a few guards who they quickly silenced.

They found the princess' room when they found a door being watched by two guards hefting staffs with blades shaped like shark tails. Hayate also said it was probably the princess' room because there looked to be an electric security seals on the door that could deliver enough voltage to power Konoha's hospital for about eight minutes with just one seal.

With his extreme speed, Kimimaro quickly dispatched the two guards, and with some fancy seal work, Anko disarmed the electric security seal.

"How'd you know how to shut that down Anko-sensei?" Naruto asked.

"Ah, I use it to torture some of my prisoners." Anko answered offhandedly before turning back to picking the lock. Naruto looked at Hayate, who grimaced in fear.

Naruto nervously approached the door and, extending an icicle from his arm and 'growing' it around the doorknob, twisted the handle and pushed the door open.

* * *

The six Konoha nin expected a lot of things when they opened the door.

Hayate expected a room full of shark-armoured goons waiting to chop them into chum to feed to their pet fish.

Anko expected a dungeon-like room filled with spiky coffins, whips, chains and lots of leather with a ragged-looking naked young girl chained to the wall.

Kisame expected it to be a fake room full of gas barrels and plastic explosives and explosive tags and any other conceivable manner of device that goes BOOM!

Kimimaro expected a cave full of bones with the princess entrapped in some giant creature's ribcage.

Naruto expected to see a beautiful girl asleep on a bed, awaiting the kiss of a handsome ninja- namely him- to awaken her from her cursed sleep, leading her to proclaiming her eternal love for him as he swept her off her feet and jumped out the window onto his valiant steed, which was actually a crocodile.

Haku expected what was closest to what they saw. The only difference was that there was no beam of light shining onto the princess' canopy bed. The window with the woman standing at it was dark.

Hearing someone come in, the princess turned around. Naruto's mouth dropped open, followed by Kisame's, Hayate's and Kimimaro's mouths. Anko's mouth remained shut, but mentally, she knew she could have some pretty good fantasies about her and this girl.

She was about 5'4", but her piled up hairdo made her look about four to six inches taller. Her face was conical in shape and her features were sharply angular but not unattractive. Her narrow eyes, with her finely groomed eyelashes, were a dark blue, darker even than Naruto's eyes. Her face was shined over with a very light layer of mocha-coloured makeup that complimented her skin and went very well with her cherry red lips. And although her formal kimono left all but her hands uncovered, it left little to the imagination. It hugged her body snugly, but was not so tight as to the point of being slutty. The design was a swirling blue with white thrown in like a vanilla vein in blue bubblegum ice cream. Looking closer, Naruto discerned them to be waves.

'_I think her imprisonment clothes just turned me off the sea forever.'_ Naruto thought.

"Are any of you my suitors?" the girl asked in a high and impatient voice. The question caught them off guard.

"Uhh... no?" Hayate answered uncertainly. The princess looked annoyed.

"Well what do you want? My suitor could arrive at any time." She snapped impatiently. Naruto's eyes narrowed in incredulity.

"... Uh, you _do_ know you're being held hostage by some shark-obsessed freak right?" he asked. The princess looked at him like he was insane.

"What are you talking about? This is the castle I'm going to get married in! The fishy guards said that my suitor should be here soon!" she protested. The six shinobi looked amongst each other. Although none of them spoke, they were all thinking the exact same thing.

'_What an airhead!'_

"Yyyyeah, I hate to break it to ya princess, but this isn't your wedding plan. Those 'fishy guards' are most likely terrorist ninja that kidnapped you for reasons unknown." Anko said slowly and clearly so the girl wouldn't misunderstand anything. Clearly, she was more stubborn than Naruto.

"No no no no no! You're all just foreigners here to force me out of the marriage and make mama and papa upset with me! Well I'm not falling for your tricks and staying right _here_!" she pouted and plopped herself down on the floor, crossing her legs and arm as she stuck her nose up in the air. Haku whistled quietly.

"What a stubborn, naïve little brat!" she whispered. "Kisame-sensei, you think you can...?" Haku asked, gesturing to the oblivious girl.

"Yup," Kisame confirmed, striding over to the princess, roughly picking her up and slinging her over his shoulder.

"HEY! PUT ME DOWN! YOU CAN'T TAKE ME AWAY FROM MY WEDDING! **PUT ME DO-" **the shrieking girl was cut off as Haku pushed a pressure point in her neck, making her go as limp as a noodle.

"Phew, thank you Haku-chan, she was doing a number on my ears." Kimimaro drawled, twisting his right finger in one of his ears.

"No problem," Haku replied, suppressing a small blush. Naruto noticed and filed the incident away under his blackmail material.

"Let's just hope she didn't wake anyone up." Hayate said nervously as he laid his hand on his blade out of nervous habit.

* * *

The princess' shriek had apparently not awoken or alerted any 'fishy guards' as the six ninja kept poking fun at.

"Looks like we're home free!" Anko declared quietly as they marched towards the unguarded door.

Famous last words.

A low rumble of a chuckle reverberated through the front atrium of the castle.

"Oh come on, did you _really _think I would let you just waltz in and ruin my plan so easily? Guess being part great white doesn't boost your brain power too much, ne Kisame?" the voice asked.

"Okay, who are you, and why are you more shark-obsessed than me?" Kisame asked loudly, passing the princess off to Naruto.

"... I'm hurt brother," said the voice before someone dropped from the ceiling.

Kisame dropped the princess to the ground as he faced the person. Apparently male, he looked to be about the same height as Kisame. His hair was a whitish-silver colour, and his skin was pasty white from what little Kisame could see. His skin-tight jumpsuit showed just how ripped he actually was. The guy was at least two hundred pounds of pure muscle. Kisame, intimidated before, grew fearful when the man removed his weapon from his back.

A silvery staff with a blade shaped like the fin of a shark.

Samehada, drawn from its wrappings, fell from Kisame's hand when the man raised his head to show his rather sharp face. It was as pasty white as his skin, but his defining features were his void black iris and pupil-less eyes. Beneath his pointed nose, his lips curled up to reveal narrow and sharp-looking conical teeth.

And just to the sides of his mouth were two sets of five gills.

One word escaped Kisame's mouth like a tiny lick of wind.

"... Ryu..."

* * *

**To be continued! Sorry for the cliffhanger, but I want to keep you coming back for more, so leave a review and tell me what you think!**

**Dirty Reid**


	8. The Paths of the Schwartz

**A Swordsman's Road**

**By: Dirty Reid**

**Chapter 7: The Paths of the Schwartz**

**A.N.: Hello again! I hope you're hungry for action, because that's all that this chapter is!**

**And if you didn't catch the Spaceballs references/quotes in the last chapter... well, you suck. And if you don't catch them in here... you really need to get back in tune with pop culture. **

\\ //_

"Ryū?" Haku repeated softly.

"As in Hayabusa Ryū, the Mako shark member of the Kirigakure Swimmer Squad that was supposed to have died?" Anko continued.

"Yep," Kisame confirmed shortly.

"Why Kisame, I'm hurt. No introduction of your friends filled to the brim with bravado and splendour?" Ryū mocked with a playful, sharky grin, filled to the brim with rows of oddly needle-like teeth.

"Nah, we're not going to (cough) stick around for introductions." Hayate wheezed as he turned towards the enormous gate... which came crashing shut with a ringing _clang _after Ryū snapped his fingers loudly.

"Now, now, it's not nice to leave so quickly. You're the first house guests I've had since I brought Princess Dumbass here, and even then, she's not particularly good company." Ryū implored them to stay while still managing to speak down to them. Not one for condescension, Naruto piped up.

"Gee dude, we'd love to stay, but, see, Anko-chan here is afraid of big scary castles. If we don't get her out of here she's gonna be screaming like a little girl pretty soon." Naruto joked. Anko turned angrily and bopped him on the noggin hard while his company laughed. Ryū even snickered a little bit.

"Can it you cockbiting fucktard! We're more than likely about to get our asses handed to us and all you can do is joke?!" Anko snapped. Kimimaro turned to her with a raised eyebrow.

"You're thinking that we might be outmatched? That's not much like you Anko. If anything, you should be jumping around like a retarded monkey who just found a banana." Haku had to slap her hand over her mouth to keep from wheezing as she laughed. Anko hammered Kimimaro on top of his head and howled in pain when she hit a skull harder than steel before she started to jump around and clutch her hand.

"Oh, there we go! She's jumping around like a retarded monkey and sounding like one too. Everything's normal!" Kisame exclaimed. Naruto crouched down and clutched his sides as he howled with laughter. Hayate was finding it hard to breathe as he wheezed in mirth. Haku had tears streaming down her face as she had her mouth open in silent laughter. Kisame was snorting his weird, snorty laugh, and Kimimaro was clutching his belly with his head thrown back. Even Ryū was chuckling at Anko's humiliation. Said woman was red in the face with anger.

"I'D KILL YOU ALL IF WE WEREN'T ON A MISSION!" She shrieked, causing Naruto to cover his ears.

"Sheesh, keep it down will ya, you little howler monkey?" he asked, making his company laugh even harder. Anko screamed in frustration.

"Well Blondie, you're certainly the highlight of the day... at least, until I've highlighted my walls with your blood." Ryū admitted as he reached for the long silver staff on his back.

"And what makes you think that we'll let you just do that?" Naruto asked as he poured chakra into two of the tattoos on his arms after dropping the princess like a sack of potatoes. In twin balls of smoke, Crocodylus and Asclepius emerged in his hands. **(A.N.: As Abe95 so kindly pointed out, the name of this sword should be Asclepius, because I mistook Caduceus as the universal medical symbol. So from here on, the healing sword will be known as Asclepius. I will also go back and change the previous chapters.)**

Aside and behind him, the sickening sound of bone piercing flesh, the metallic ring of Seihyō, the dull clack of Murasaki and Gengetsu and the almost nonexistent whoosh of Samehada answered his silent call to arms. Ryū's expression of quiet amusement remained firmly in place.

"Oh, nothing. I just hope you can put up a good fight." he replied in that same casual, nonchalant voice as he pulled his weapon from its resting place on his back and held it like a walking stick. The main body of the weapon was a gleaming silver staff that looked like it had been polished for hours on end. Two black pads spaced evenly on the staff served as grips. On the lower end of the staff was a large silver spine with six branch spines blooming around it like an extremely deadly flower.

On the more business end of the staff was a blade. True to the fat female dignitary's words, it looked like the tail of a shark. The blade was two-pronged. The shorter blade was slightly broader than the longer one. What would have been the bottom of the shark's tail was wickedly sharpened, and small serrations made the inner part of the blade that much more dangerous. The upper blade was exactly the same, but thinner and longer.

'_A weapon that can slash and crush. Interesting,' _Kisame thought.

For a moment, the air stood still in anticipation. Electricity almost seemed to spontaneously charge as the coming battle ramped up to its beginning.

Impatience getting the better of him, Naruto charged. Kisame's cries for him to come back because Ryū was so much more skilled than him fell on deaf ears. Adrenalin flooded his veins as he swung Crocodylus and gave it some chakra, unlatching the links that kept the sword together. The segmented blade stretched to its full length and came at Ryū at a horrific speed.

The Mako man admitted that he was surprised by the use of a chain sword and quickly ducked the unexpected attack that would have surely hit his neck. He straightened up just in time to bring his staff forwards and block the blonde's strike with his second sword. The chain sword had reformed itself and Naruto used it to swipe at Ryū, who seemed preoccupied with Asclepius. The shark man spun his staff, throwing Naruto off balance and deflected Crocodylus' blow before bringing the staff up and clocking Naruto in the head with the flower-like spines.

Naruto gave a sharp little cry as the extremely sharp spines pierced the skin on his forehead and scalp. He took a step back as the blood trickled into his eyes and let out his breath in a huff when a very hard and strong foot implanted itself on his chest. Naruto flew back a couple of feet before he landed awkwardly on his foot, lost his balance, tripped and rolled along his side until he landed on his back.

"NARUTO-KUN!" Haku cried as she witnessed her cousin's loss to a man who wasn't even trying.

"I tried to warn him... Aww, crap!" Kisame groaned as Anko darted forwards, accompanied by Kimimaro. Ryū's amused face didn't even twitch.

Anko opened up her assault with a spinning slash. Ryū leaned to the side and countered by jamming the flower into the ground. Clutching the staff tightly, he threw himself forwards and tried to kick Anko, but missed when she jumped back. He turned his head and snapped off a quick kick to Kimimaro's jaw with sufficient force to dislocate it. The Kaguya heir flipped backwards and set his bloodline to work repairing his jaw before he dashed back in.

Anko began her assault with a Tsubaki no mai, thrusting her blade at speeds that even she sometimes had trouble keeping up with. Ryū however, easily countered by spinning his shark staff rapidly, creating spark flares where the tip of Murasaki met the spinning staff. Anko growled in frustration and cut the dance short. She reversed her grip on Murasaki and tried to hit Ryū with the butt of the hilt. He deflected the blow and the following backhand swipe before he brought his staff over his head and caught Kimimaro with the pole. Ryū jumped into the air, spinning his staff over his head and struck Murasaki with the flower hard enough to shatter the blade. Anko stumbled from the force of the blow as Ryū turned again and raked the flower across Kimimaro's hardened ribcage. As Kimimaro fell from his feet, Ryū turned and swung the blade end of his staff at Anko. She brought up Murasaki's handle and the few inches of blade left to try and deflect the blow. The sheer force behind the strike knocked the broken sword out of Anko's hands and put a large gash on her hands and wrists. Anko grunted as her skin opened up and blood poured out. Ryū continued to let his momentum turn him about, bringing his right leg up into an axe kick and slamming his heel down on the back of Anko's head.

Her face slammed into the stone floor, shattering the cartilage in her nose and rendering her unconscious. She gave off a _pop_, signifying a Kage Bunshin. Ryū looked up, but was unable to dodge the incoming handful of needles that caught him in the shoulder socket and breast. The pain was just enough to distract him long enough for Naruto to kick him in the left hip.

Ryū fell to the ground roughly. He grabbed at the icy needles and bared his needle-like teeth at Naruto- now lacking any of his previous lacerations- and Haku, who had thrown the needles as soon as she had gotten a clear shot.

"Not bad sweetheart," Ryū growled as he pulled out the last needle and crushed it. "I'll be sure to watch you for any more pesky ice bits next time."

"There won't _be_ a next time!" Naruto declared. Ryū backflipped to avoid the blonde's noticeably larger blade. He glanced over at the sword and let out a small whistle.

"You gave Hoshizora to that kid Kisame? That doesn't sound like you." Ryū commented as he deflected the more powerful but slower attacks from the blonde. He stepped up his game when Kimimaro joined the fight and Anko came out of her hiding spot to work in tandem with the blonde.

Haku watched her cousin, his sensei and the man she would not admit she was crushing on tackle the Mako man. She gripped Seihyō's hilt tighter as she prepared to join the brawl, but Kisame's large hand clamped down onto hers.

"Kisame-san, I need to help them!" Haku protested. Kisame shook his head.

"You're the medic here Haku-chan. If you (cough) die, we're screwed." Hayate pointed out. The ice user looked at him weirdly.

"Well what the hell are you doing here?" she asked. Hayate looked at her like she was retarded.

"We were assigned this mission together Haku. I can't just up and leave on you can I?" he asked. If Haku was sitting at one of the granite countertop bars in her home, she would have banged her head on it.

"Okay, let me rephrase that: Why the _hell_ aren't you helping Naruto-kun, Kimimaro and Anko-sensei?" Haku asked with more than just a hint of anger tingeing her voice. Hayate looked surprised.

"...Oh. Yeah, why the hell aren't I helping?" he asked himself before he crouched and charged into glorious battle, Gengetsu following with her blade trailing.

"Sometimes I worry about him." Kisame said under his breath.

"And why aren't you helping them?" Haku snapped.

"Because I'm doing this," Kisame walked calmly up to the gates and took a hold of two bars. He grunted with effort as he began to pull on the metal.

"Oh yeah, sure, you're trying to bust us out, eh scaredy shark? 1000 ryou says your little escape attempt get us all killed." Haku growled when Kisame didn't reply.

'_Honestly, why do I even bother?' _Haku asked herself as she threw up her arms and prepared to fight.

Just as she was about to join the fray, she heard a metallic groan. She whipped around and saw that Kisame had actually managed to bend the iron bars and was slowly prying them further apart. He stopped bending them and turned to face Haku with a cheeky, toothy grin on his face.

"I believe you owe me 1000 ryou Haku-chan." Kisame said smugly before he turned back to opening up the gate. Haku's mouth had dropped open.

"... _MOTHER_--!"

"Hyoton: Fubuki no jutsu!" Naruto's voice rose above Haku's curse as he launched a freezing blast of air at Ryū. Haku knew something wasn't right when it caught the grey-skinned man dead in the chest. Like a charm, he dissolved into water. Just as Haku wondered where Ryū was, a whitish flash passed by Naruto. Said blonde cried out in pain when a large gash opened on the right side of his waist. He fell to his knees and clutched the bleeding wound as it began to heal slowly while pressing the tip of Hoshizora's blade into the ground to keep himself upright.

Anko was swinging her sword wildly at Ryū, but with enough forethought put in to make the strikes effective. It seemed she was making Ryū keep on the defensive and ensuring that it wasn't easy for him. But alas, when Hayate came in to slash Ryū from behind, the shark man ducked his strike and used a butterfly jump to evade Anko's low swipe that would have cut him across the thighs. Ryū landed on one foot and used the one still in the air to try and kick Hayate. The pale swordsmaster leaned back to avoid the blow and brought his blade across the side of Ryū's calf. A small spurt of blood flew from inside the ripped combat pants and Ryū grunted in pain. He retreated with a backflip and landed in a crouch.

"Finally, someone got under my guard." Ryū praised Hayate's efforts. He was about to say something when Naruto got back on his feet, oddly free of any injuries but covered in blood and rips in his clothing.

"Why won't you die?" he asked. Naruto grinned when he heard some irritation in the Mako man's voice.

"I'm like a Weeble pal; I wobble, but I don't fall down." Naruto shot back as he handled Hoshizora with the flat side of the blade facing the ground.

If there was one thing Ryū despised above all else, it was being one-upped. "Well, guess that means I'll just have to stop playing and knock you around even harder." he growled with a flash of his teeth before he shot off so fast he was almost a blur.

'_Holy crap, not even Lee moves that quickly!' _Naruto thought before he was hit by a wall of pain. Ryū caught him in the chest with a very hard punch before moving with blinding speed and beaned him in the head with the flower again. After he raked the spines along Naruto's head for the second time, he spun the staff and cut Naruto across the left shoulder socket. He followed up with another strike to Naruto's right shoulder using the flower, resulting in a dull _crack_. Naruto cried out in agony but was silenced when Ryū planted his left foot on Naruto's chest and vaulted off of him.

Anko dodged Ryū's initial downward strike with the blade of his staff, but she did not expect him to stick it into the ground and use it as a pole vault to slam the top of his foot into her chin. The force of the blow sent her back a couple of steps and made her drop her guard enough for Ryū to catch her in the stomach with the flower. Luckily for her, she was wearing plate armour and it slowed the spine down enough to prevent it from going as deep as it would have. Anko groaned in pain and fell down, clutching her bleeding belly. Ryū passed her off as a threat and moved on to his other adversaries. Opportunity presented, Haku rushed in and began to tend to Anko's wounds. While her injuries were probably not as serious as Naruto's, she wasn't able to regenerate her flesh in seconds.

"Mph... Thanks Haku." Anko expressed her gratitude with a grunt of pain.

"Stay still Anko-san, you'll only make your injury hurt more." Haku reprimanded her before she imbued her hands with aqua green regenerative chakra and began to pour it into Anko's stab wound.

Meanwhile, Ryū was finding it rather irritating dealing with the Kaguya boy. No matter how fast or hard his strikes were, the boy just wouldn't go down. Granted, he'd been slashed a couple of times, but having a bloodline that naturally made holes in his skin meant that regeneration was part of the gifted abilities. He had truly hoped it would not have to come to bringing out the jutsu, because he had never had this much fun in a long time. Sadly, his fun was not to last. Raking the blade along the ground and throwing up a flare of sparks bright enough to cause Kimimaro to falter, Ryū leaped back and flipped through a couple of seals.

'_Suit__ō__n: Tarentepp__ōdama!'_ **(Water Release: Multiple Gunshot) **Ryū said mentally, this marking him as the only shinobi to ever not state the name of his jutsu aloud. He wound his upper body back and opened his mouth, releasing multiple large balls of water the size of soccer balls. Hayate got clipped in the shoulder by one and spun away as he was thrown into the air. Kimimaro's expression hardened as he did a quick pirouette around the first bullet and used a chakra extension on his bone sword to slice through the compressed energy in the second one. He used a chakra-powered kick to cancel the third one and tried to use chakra fusion to freeze the last one before shattering it, but he still couldn't do it quick enough and got hit straight in the chest.

Kimimaro was pretty sure he felt his harder-than-steel bones fracture or snap as the huge amount of force behind the water-based attack. He left his feet extremely quickly and flew backwards through the air. He angled himself to land on his lower arms and knees to slow his skid down. He growled in pain, gradually increasing the volume as more and more skin was scraped off of his arms and legs. He came to a slow stop, trailing streaks of blood along his path. Looking up was a mistake. Ryū's foot smashed into his jaw, either dislocating his spine or inducing severe whiplash as he was thrust upwards and fell onto his back. Ryū grinned his sharky grin as he lifted his staff and prepared to thrust the blade through Kimimaro's chest.

"One down," he rumbled before he began to thrust the staff.

_Ting_! A blue-tinged blade interrupted Ryū's killing stab. Ryū spun his staff to deflect a second blow and used both hands to parry a third. He fell back a step when he felt something like ice dust hit him. The tiny fragments made equally tiny cuts in his black tank top and greyish skin. Though the cuts barely bled at all, the coldness of the ice dust stung like a bitch.

That tiny moment of distraction was all Haku needed. Having long since memorized the chakra flow patterns for her signature jutsu, she began to gather the water from Ryū's Tarenteppōdama and form them into a large hexagonal Makyō Hyōshō with a top to it.

Ryū looked on at the mirrors with interest as an image of the medical kunoichi appeared in every one of them. "Interesting little parlour trick you have here, missy." he commented amusedly.

"You won't be saying that for long." Haku replied before she began to toss senbon needles from every direction. Ryū roared in pain as the icy and steel needles pierced his skin. Granted, they didn't go in very far but they still hurt.

"Samekenbuin Ninpō: Bakuhatsuryoku!" **(Shark Blade Staff Ninja Art: Explosive Power) **Ryū barked as he jumped into the air while spinning Samekenbuin as it was apparently called, at an alarmingly fast rate. Haku got a bad feeling when the silver staff began to glow, and closed her eyes when Ryū thrust the flower into the ground and let off a very high-powered pulse of energy. Never had Haku been doubtful that her mirrors could shatter because of an attack… until now. The pulse of energy immediately cracked the mirrors and the weaker aftershock shattered them entirely, throwing Haku-- who had the sense to jump out of them-- backwards like a doll. She managed to drag Seihyō along the ground and slow herself enough to land on her feet. She raised Seihyō just in time to block Ryū's downward strike. The sheer force behind the blow overpowered her and left her open. Ryū bared his teeth as he prepared to thrust the blade straight through the girl's heart.

But for the umpteenth time that day, his killing stroke was averted. Something very large and white crashed into the side of Samekenbuin, knocking it away from the now aware girl. Ryū growled at the owner of what was clearly Samehada when he should have leaned away from the backhanded hook punch Kisame hit him with.

Ryū stumbled back and clutched at his mouth. _Ptui_! He spat out a chipped tooth and the piece that had been taken off. He felt one of his new ones getting ready to move in as he stared at Kisame, clearly irritated.

"Go! Now!" Kisame barked. Ryū looked over to the four conscious amateur sword users (Hayate was being carried) carting their own and the princess out of an opening Kisame had pulled in the bars of the gate.

\\ //_

"Kisame, you're no fun." Ryū complained. Kisame's hard expression did not waver.

"Why did you never contact me Ryū? I would have tracked you down and traveled together with you if I had known you were still alive." Kisame asked his fellow shark man. Ryū looked at Kisame almost dubiously.

"I guess they never taught you about ichthyology since most of us didn't make it. Kisame, with the exception of a few breeds, sharks are solitary creatures. Those that do not work together often resort to killing sharks who intrude on their territory. Mako and Great Whites are no exceptions to this rule." the Mako man loosened his grip on Samekenbuin and threw it to the ground with a reverberating _clang_.

"You're not giving up, are you?" Kisame asked. Ryū rolled his eyes.

"No. Tell me that the Mizukage at least taught you how to use our _other_ gift." he wiggled his thin black eyebrows after he closed his sentence. Kisame understood the cryptic message and grinned.

"At last. I haven't had a subject to test this on yet." Kisame admitted aloud as he reached into his vest pocket, tossing Samehada to the side as though he did not know why he had it in the first place.

"You didn't have a test subject, or you think that the world wasn't ready for the awesomeness of… the Schwartz?" Ryū paused for dramatic effect. He too reached into a pocket and pulled out a small object.

"I didn't think they were ready for the Schwartz." Kisame confirmed as he placed the object on his right index finger. It was a ring with an open Great White shark's mouth where the jewel should have been.

"Hm," Ryū grunted as he placed his ring on his finger. His ring also depicted a shark with its mouth open, but a Mako instead of a Great White. Ryū grasped his right wrist with his left hand and began to channel an energy that had never before been heard of in the Elemental Nation, save for the myth-mongering Mizukage. His habit had actually paid off when he found someone who could use the power he had obsessed over. He had taken cells from the man and integrated them into the genetic matter that was later injected into the ten fetuses that were to be the Kirigakure Swimmer Squad. Those few precious cells would grant the swimmers powers that could have given them the potential to bring down entire countries. Although why it was called 'The Schwartz', Kisame did not know. He could think of several far more fitting names for the psychokinetic gift he was blessed with.

_Snap-hiss_! A short flash of light gave way to a beam of silvery light extending from the mouth of Ryū's ring. It was a little more than two feet long once it finished extending and it thrummed a low pitch as Ryū held it defensively in front of him.

_Snap-hiss_! A second flash gave way to a sapphire blue blade of light extending from the mouth of Kisame's ring. It too was just over two feet long and thrummed with an identical frequency.

"You have the ring. And I see your Schwartz is as big as mine." Ryū commented. The shark men simultaneously lowered their gazes to their Schwartz sabers, which coincidentally, were both originating from the rings they had both placed rather close to their crotches. Neither of them laughed at the double entendre.

"Now let's see how well you 'handle' it." Ryū suggested before he wound up and took a wide swing at Kisame. The blue man brought his blade up and blocked Ryū's strike, prompting a sort of snapping noise as the blades of light came in contact with each other. Kisame parried Ryū's strike and followed up with one of his own.

For a couple of minutes, the shark men simply swung at each other with their blades, testing one another. Finally, they reached a deadlock when Kisame stopped one of Ryū's overhead strikes and attempted to push the blade away. Their blades crackled like badly tuned radios before Kisame stepped back and Ryū did a backflip away.

"The Schwartz has whispered its instructions to you as well Kisame. I'm impressed." Ryū praised. Kisame held his arm up in front of him, Schwartz saber pointed at his Mako adversary.

"What's say we stop playing around?" he asked.

"Why not," Ryū shrugged before darting forwards.

Kisame lowered his blade and swung it back and forth to block the flurry of rotating wrist strikes from Ryū. He deflected one and brought his arm around full circle to strike at his adversary. Ryū stopped the strike and delivered a backhand slash that would have taken Kisame's head off had he not ducked. Ryū followed with a swipe to Kisame's legs, but again, Kisame evaded the attack that would have lopped his shins off by jumping. Ryū stopped his saber right where the junction between Kisame's legs would be when he landed, but Kisame brought his saber down to protect himself. The blue man flung his arm forwards in an impromptu strike, but being as speedy as he was, Ryū stopped the blade and swatted it away.

For a moment, the two stared at each other. _Zshwee_! Both of them shut down their blades and thrust their Schwartz rings forwards. Both rings shot out a bolt of lightning, which met at a point directly between the two and canceled out. Both of them continued to blast at each other with the energy, but neither gave an inch; the stone beneath the intersecting lightning bolts was actually starting to crack and move away from the high-powered ball of Schwartz.

By some chance, a bright discharge from the intersecting lightning bolts caused Kisame to squint and lose some of his focus, allowing Ryū to pump some extra energy into his lightning. The cancellation point fizzled out as Ryū's bolt slammed into Kisame's chest, stunning him before Ryū cut the electricity and launched a mass of air that sent Kisame barreling through the air.

He landed after he hit the wall adjacent to the gate. As if the blow to his spine wasn't enough, Kisame landed awkwardly on his left shoulder. He grunted loudly in pain as he raised himself upwards.

"HRAAAGH!" Kisame roared as he made a slashing motion with his right arm, channeling the Schwartz through his ring. A pulse of energy distorted the air around Ryū and lifted the Mako man into the air, flinging him to Kisame's right. Ryū hit the ground and rolled a few times before he skidded along his back. He groaned softly before he activated his Schwartz saber to stop a blow from Kisame's own saber that would have bisected his head. Ryū snapped off a quick kick that hit Kisame's hand and he rolled away before using his legs to spring upwards.

Kisame was getting agitated by the battle with his would-be partner and went in for a killing strike. Ryū responded in kind by swinging his Schwartz saber.

The two blades met with a loud crack… and twisted around each other like a rope.

Ryū looked at the entwined blades. Kisame looked at the entwined blades.

"… Shit! I hate it when I get my Schwartz twisted!" Ryū cursed.

"This has happened to you before?" Kisame asked rather dubiously.

"Nah, that line just seemed to fit the scene. Ain't that right?" Ryū asked no one in particular as he stared into the thin air of his castle.

Yeah, it really did, a voice answered back.

"Who said that?" Kisame asked.

"The author; he's running out of funny things to say, so he turned his attention to the Fourth Wall." Ryū explained.

"'Fourth Wall'? 'The author'? What the hell are you talking about Ryū?" Kisame asked.

"… Oh, nothing. Let's focus on getting back to our fight here."

"Okay, um, maybe if I put my leg up here on yours we can split them apart… Yeah, yeah, like that." Kisame had his foot up on Ryū's bent knee and was getting ready to spring apart.

"Okay, on three. One, two, three!" Kisame pushed off of Ryū's knee and Ryū stepped backwards, effectively fragmenting their Schwartz sabers before the energy reconnected itself. Not missing a beat, Ryū deactivated his blade and swung his arm, unleashing a pulse of energy that sent Kisame soaring. It was clear who was more experienced in using the Schwartz.

That's not to say Kisame couldn't be creative or learn on the fly. He created a cocoon of energy around him and launched himself back at Ryū. The Mako man was not expecting this, and was therefore unprepared for Kisame's elbow ramming into his gut. Ryū gasped for air and stumbled backwards a little bit. Not wasting any time, Kisame used the Schwartz to grab him and toss him into the wall. Ryū hit with a dull _thud_, and Kisame rammed him into the wall again.

"You tried to promote war between Konoha and Kiri," Kisame stated, raising his arm and using the Schwartz to slam Ryū into the ground.

"You left me alone when we were supposed to be lifelong partners," he continued, cocking back his ring hand and bringing Ryū with it, stopping him with an outstretched fist. Ryū fell backwards and tried to zap Kisame with his Schwartz lightning, and almost succeeding. Kisame channeled his own Schwartz energy just in time to catch the lightning bolt and send it straight back at Ryū. The force of the counter attack blasted the Mako man into the iron bars of the bent gate. The impact dented the gate even further.

"And worst of all, you tried to kill me and my friends!" Kisame shouted, launching a bolt of lightning at Ryū, causing his body to spasm and making him cry out in pain.

"Your time has come, Hayabusa Ryū." Kisame stated almost like a judge. In one last ditch attempt, Ryū activated his Schwartz saber and took a swing. Kisame activated his blue blade and brought it up to cut Ryū's hand off. The Mako man roared in pain when his hand fell to the ground, not eased in the slightest when the wound cauterized from the heat of the energy blade. Ryū fell to his knees, clutching the stump where his hand used to be and awaiting the slice that would take his head off.

But it never came. Ryū looked up and saw Kisame in a back stance, right arm drawn back with his fist facing forwards and his left palm directly parallel to his knuckles. Between his fist and his palm was a pulsating ball of Schwartz energy. Realizing what Kisame was about to do, Ryū looked into his counterpart's angry eyes.

"The Schwartz has grown strong in you Kisame, as it has and will in others." he remarked. Whether that was just a compliment or a cryptic clue, Kisame would figure out later.

"Goodbye Ryū," he whispered before he thrust his right fist forwards.

The blast of energy that followed Kisame's thrust was felt by the swordsmen who had fled to the cliff's edge, and were non-Schwartz sensitive to boot. Ryū zoomed backwards, busting a hole in the bars of the gate as he was driven out of the castle.

Outside near the cliffs, Team Bloodline, Anko and the recently awakened Hayate were thrown for a loop when they saw Hayabusa Ryū's broken form spinning through the air, hitting the ground a few feet from them before bouncing along and rolling off the cliff.

"Holy shit! How the hell did Kisame do to do that?" Anko exclaimed.

\\ //_

Back in the castle, Kisame simply stared at the broken gate with a far off expression on his face. He felt some satisfaction, having defeated such a worthy opponent, but he also felt guilty for ending the life of a man he was supposed to share a bond with; a bond that was to be deeper than brotherhood; a bond that was deeper than any blood ties.

He would mourn later. Kisame turned to the left side of the gate and laid his beady little eyes on Ryū's severed hand. Kisame extended his ring hand and used the Schwartz to call Ryū's ring off of his dead finger. The ring flew towards Kisame and he opened his hand to catch it.

'_You may be dead __Ryū, but you're not forgotten.' _Kisame turned about while placing Ryū's ring in his pocket and using the Schwartz to call Samehada to him. Samekenbuin caught his eye as he was preparing to leave. For a long moment, he considered the silver staff and whether or not he should claim it as a trophy or toss it out to sea with its master. It was much lighter than Samehada and offered a wider range of attacks. While it could not devour the chakra of an opponent, it clearly could let off explosive blasts of energy, not unlike the Schwartz repulse. And that was only one ability Ryū had displayed with it. Perhaps, given some time and some luck, Samekenbuin would come to accept Kisame as a more worthy master that saw to do good in the world.

'_If Samekenbuin is Schwartz sensitive, perhaps it can teach me something. The Schwartz told me that I've barely even tapped the vastness of my potential; maybe something else that uses it can help me along the way.' _

With a final Schwartz pull, Kisame brought Samekenbuin to his hand and removed his ring, once again hiding his channel for one of the greatest powers to have ever existed. But the rush that came with the power merely dwindled as he held the silver staff.

'_I hope we can accept each other one day.'_ Kisame mentally implored the staff, to which he received no reply. He shrugged and began his lurch out of the temple. His back was still rather sore and Samekenbuin served as a good walking stick.

Kisame didn't know for sure, but it was probably his subconscious use of the Schwartz on his nerves that kept him from blowing up at the snail's pace they took for the first two days back to the village. It probably helped him not say something stupid when answering the bombardment of questions from his peers and the bitching of the princess too.

\\ //_

**There we go, Chapter 7! Some Spaceballs-inspired action and humour, and I set Kisame up to be even more badass!**

**By the way, Ryū's line about the Schwartz to Kisame... yeah, that was pretty bad foreshadowing, eh?**

**Anyways, I hope you enjoyed this chapter. Leave a review, but MAKE IT CONSTRUCTIVE! Like so:**

**1) Tell me if you liked this chapter or not.**

**2) Specify what you liked about this chapter**

**3) Specify what you didn't like about this chapter**

**4) Recommend a suitable improvement**

**Peace out,**

**Dirty Reid**


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